New experts in the ReAct Toolbox Advisory Group!

2023-02-23

ReAct welcomes new members to the ReAct Toolbox Advisory Group. The advisory group is composed of renowned experts from the antibiotic resistance field and provides strategic and scientific advice to help keep the ReAct Toolbox up to date and relevant.

ReAct warmly welcomes three new members to the expert advisory group for the ReAct Toolbox:

• Professor Alistair Boxall
• Doctor Esmita Charani and
• Doctor Arshnee Moodley.

ReAct also welcomes back former advisors:

• Professor Rumina Hasan
• Doctor Francis J Ndowa, Doctor Uduak Okomo and
• Professor Yonghong Xiao

The advisory group is composed of renowned experts from the antibiotic resistance field. They provide strategic and scientific advice to help keep the ReAct Toolbox up to date and relevant. They come from a variety of professional backgrounds and geographic locations, to reflect diverse settings and work as antibiotic resistance is a global health challenge.

3 new experts join the ReAct Toolbox Advisory Group

• Alistair Boxall, Professor in Environmental Science in the Environment Department at the University of York and Director of the NERC-funded ECORISC Centre for Doctoral Training.

His research focuses on understanding emerging and future ecological and health risks posed by human and veterinary medicines in the natural environment.

“We now recognize that pollution of the natural environment by antibiotics and other contaminants may be contributing to the antimicrobial resistance crisis.

My team is working to understand the levels of antibiotic pollution in rivers across the globe and to assess the implications for resistance. By doing this, we hope to identify hotspots of risk allowing us to target interventions at areas and activities that really matter.”

• Dr. Esmita Charani (MPharm) a Reader in Infectious Diseases, AMR, and Global Health at the University of Liverpool.

She is also an honorary Associate Professor at the University of Cape Town where she will be undertaking a Wellcome Trust Fellowship investigating intersectionality and antimicrobial resistance. Her work has been recognised through the Academy of Medical Sciences UK-India Antimicrobial Resistance Visiting Professor award.

“There are still many questions we do not know about how the impact of antimicrobial resistance manifested in different populations.

In our team we aim to investigate the interconnectedness of social constructs such as race, class, ethnicity, gender and how these overlap within interdependent systems, influencing infection related health seeking and health providing behaviors and antimicrobial resistance.”

• Dr. Arshnee Moodley is the leader of the CGIAR Antimicrobial Resistance Hub and AMR Team leader at the International Livestock Research Institute in Nairobi, Kenya.

She is also jointly appointed as an Associate Professor at the Department of Veterinary and Animal Sciences, University of Copenhagen, Denmark.

“The work we do is focused on quantifying antimicrobial consumption and understanding drivers of antibiotic use in small-holder to semi intensive food production systems in countries with very limited resources to address antimicrobial resistance.

Our goal is to generate much needed evidence that informs AMR-policies, and develop interventions that are locally relevant and applicable.

I believe that ILRI and the CGIAR AMR Hub are uniquely positioned to support efforts in low-and middle-income countries to mitigate agriculture-associated AMR, as we build on the over 50 years history of the CGIAR working with multi-stakeholders in the agricultural sector in low-and middle-income countries.”

Welcome back to former advisors

ReAct is equally glad for the continued commitment from our previous advisors, who have provided valuable feedback in the past years in shaping the ReAct Toolbox content and strategy:

• Professor Rumina Hasan is based in Pakistan at the Department of Pathology and Laboratory Medicine at the Aga Khan University, Karachi.

Her areas of interest include tuberculosis and antimicrobial resistance, and she has served on the WHO Strategic Technical Advisory Group on Antimicrobial Resistance (STAG-AMR) 2017-2020.

• Dr. Francis J Ndowa is based in Zimbabwe.

He is a specialist physician in Venereology and Dermatology, and works as international consultant on surveillance and control of sexually transmitted infections & gonococcal antimicrobial resistance.

• Dr. Uduak Okomo is a Clinical Research Fellow in Maternal and Newborn Health within the Vaccines and Immunity Theme, MRC Unit The Gambia at London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

A pediatrician and epidemiologist by training, her focus is on improving maternal, newborn and child health in sub-Saharan Africa through engagement in research aimed at informing health policy.

• Professor Yonghong Xiao is a Principal Investigator at Zhejiang University in China.

He is the founder and leader of the Chinese Ministry of Health National AMR Investigation Net (Mohnarin), and also a member of the National Committee for Drug Rational Use of China.