Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR)
Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) is one of the most serious and rapidly growing threats to global health, development, and security. Globally, AMR already contributes to millions of deaths each year and is projected to cause severe health, social, and economic consequences if urgent action is not taken. Globally, 39 million people are expected to die from AMR between 2025 and 2050 – according to the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation (IHME)
AMR occurs when bacteria, viruses, fungi, and parasites no longer respond to medicines designed to kill them, making common infections harder, more expensive, and sometimes impossible to treat. This undermines decades of progress in modern medicine and threatens the effectiveness of life-saving interventions such as surgery, childbirth, and cancer treatment.
In Uganda, antimicrobial resistance is an escalating public health challenge driven by behavioural, systemic, and structural factors, particularly at community and primary healthcare levels. Antibiotics are widely used without prescriptions, especially in rural and peri-urban communities, and limited understanding of correct dosing, treatment completion, and antibiotic stewardship contributes to misuse.
According to One Health Trust, “In Uganda, in 2021, there were 5,616 deaths attributed to bacterial AMR”.
Preventable infections such as malaria, respiratory infections, diarrheal diseases, and wound infections continue to drive antibiotic overuse. Children, women, and vulnerable households are disproportionately affected due to delayed care-seeking, reliance on informal medicine sources, and limited access to accurate health information.
AMR threatens Uganda’s health system gains, increases healthcare costs, prolongs illness, and undermines progress toward Universal Health Coverage (UHC) and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). It also hampers effective control of tuberculosis, malaria, and HIV/AIDS.
Community-based interventions are critical to achieving the WHO Global Action Plan objectives. In Uganda, AMR is largely driven by inappropriate antimicrobial use, limited health literacy, unrestricted access to antibiotics, and preventable infections at household and primary healthcare levels.
CHAIN’s work directly supports the WHO Global Action Plan 2015 and the AMR National Action Plan 2024/25-2028/29 by improving AMR awareness through child-centred education, strengthening infection prevention through hand hygiene promotion, and optimizing antimicrobial use through medication safety education. By targeting children early in life, CHAIN contributes to sustained behavior change that extends to families and communities.
This prevention-first, people-centred approach complements national AMR strategies and supports global efforts to preserve the effectiveness of life-saving antimicrobials for current and future generations.
The Community Health and Information Network (CHAIN) contributes to addressing AMR through prevention-focused, community-centred approaches that strengthen health literacy and promote responsible antimicrobial use.
- Key interventions include:
- Start Early in Life Initiative (SEILI): Empowering school-aged children
- Hand hygiene promotion to reduce preventable infections
- Medication safety education to improve adherence and reduce misuse
- Engaging and empowering primary healthcare level health workers, Community Owned Resources(CORs) including; Community Health Workers(CHW), religious ,cultural and political leaders
- CHAIN drama group composed of CHW who are first point of contact in communities
