Axios: With antibiotic resistance growing, WHO promotes monitoring tool
“Due to the lack of new antibiotics in the pipeline, current drugs must be better monitored and prescribed before the problem of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) reaches a ‘Titanic’ stage, World Health Organization scientists warned Tuesday as they launch a campaign to promote the use of a monitoring tool, AWaRe…” (O’Reilly, 6/18).

CIDRAP News: New AWaRe tool aims to guide antibiotic use globally
“…The tool, called AWaRe (for Access, Watch, and Reserve), was developed by the WHO Essential Medicines List to reduce the spread of antimicrobial resistance (AMR), antibiotic-related adverse events, and drug costs. ‘Antimicrobial resistance is one of the most urgent health risks of our time and threatens to undo a century of medical progress,’ said Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, PhD, WHO director general, in a press release [Tuesday] about AWaRe…” (Soucheray, 6/18).

Healio: WHO launches campaign to promote antibiotics classification program
“…Developed in 2017, AWaRe classifies antibiotics into three groups — those used for the most common and serious infections, which should be widely and cheaply available (‘access’); those with higher resistance potential (‘watch’); and those that should be used sparingly or as a last resort (‘reserve’)…” (Gramigna, 6/18).

The Telegraph: Countries risking spread of superbugs by failing to monitor antibiotic usage
“…WHO hopes that the new tool will encourage more countries to collect data on consumption of antibiotics in the different categories — an important way of tackling superbugs. … Most European countries collect data on appropriate use, alongside the Russian Federation, Canada, and a handful of countries in Latin America and Africa. However, there are some notable exceptions: the United States does not track different categories of antibiotic consumption and neither do populous countries such as India — where superbugs are rife — and China…” (Gulland, 6/18).

Additional coverage of the WHO’s AWaRe tool is available from The BMJ, U.N. News, and Xinhua News.