Swab and Send: a citizen science, antibiotic discovery project

Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) is one of the greatest, global healthcare challenges of our time. It is an anthropogenically amplified natural response by bacteria and fungi to the selective pressure provided by extensive and excessive use of antimicrobials. The scale of use of antimicrobial compounds is truly astonishing and underpins their position as cornerstones of both developing and developed national scale healthcare and food production systems.

Whilst the importance of antimicrobials to society is in no doubt, companies involved in research and development of antimicrobials struggle to make their research effort viable from the perspective of economic return. There has been an exodus of pharmaceutical companies from the antimicrobial development field, including pharmaceutical giants such as AstraZeneca, Novartis, and Sanofi and recent bankruptcy of smaller companies (Achaeogen, Melinta and Tetraphase) despite these having successfully navigated complex regulatory hurdles and bringing an antibiotic to market. The reasons for these divestitures and insolvencies are due to the lack of returns associated with the current for-profit economic model of financial reimbursement for bringing a new antimicrobial product to market.