Why the area of antimicrobial resistance?
Antimicrobial resistance, or AMR, occurs when bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites change over time and no longer respond to the medicines used to treat them. As a result, antimicrobial medicine such as antibiotics and antifungals, become ineffective and infections persist in the body.
At least 1.27 million deaths are already directly attributed to AMR each year - more deaths than malaria. Half of these deaths occur in children under the age of 5. Beyond the health effects, there is a profound economic cost to AMR- it has a great cost for patients, for healthcare systems and for the economy. The CDC estimates that the cost of AMR is $55 billion every year in the USA alone. Concerningly, AMR is increasing at an alarming rate. Accordingly, the WHO recognises AMR as one of the greatest public health threats facing humanity.
However, for many reasons, the global response to AMR has not been commensurate with its health and economic harms. As a result, however, there are a number of uniquely and highly impactful opportunities to significantly reduce the burden of AMR.
Our mission?
The AMR Funding Circle aims to identify, vet and prioritise different projects and organisations working on AMR. In the process. its goal is to support impactful work in the area, and to help co-ordinate the field at large.
What we do
A funding circle is a collaboration between a number of funders who typically target a certain cause area. They are a powerful way to help funders make evidence-based decisions in fields that they care about, which in turn leverages and coordinates multiple funders that share a common interest.
Having different funder views is really important for a good funding ecosystem, but a funding circle has the added, massive benefit of having a centralised point of contact. It means that there is a central group that can identify and prioritise promising opportunities from a cross-sector perspective, ensuring that impactful projects don't slip through the cracks. It further means that projects which fall outside the scope or budget of one member, communication channels are open and ready for them to pass and/or share the project with other grantmakers. Further, it means organizations can apply as if applying to a single large funder, but gain exposure to several potential funders.
There are several other funding circles that exist, such as Mulago, Just Impact and Mental Health Funding Circle.
Interested in joining our network?
We are always looking for more funders to join our network, although we do try to keep the group small enough to allow easy cross-member engagement. Typically this means committing one hour a month for a meeting, plus about an hour outside of the meeting to consider opportunities. To join the network there is also a $50,000 per year minimum expected contribution to the cause area of AMR.
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