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ORIGINAL RESEARCH article

Front. Water
Sec. Water and Human Health
Volume 6 - 2024 | doi: 10.3389/frwa.2024.1359109
This article is part of the Research Topic Antibiotic Resistance in Water Environments and its Impact to Human Health View all articles

A One Health approach for monitoring antimicrobial resistance: Developing a national freshwater pilot effort

Provisionally accepted
Alison M. Franklin Alison M. Franklin 1*Daniel L. Weller Daniel L. Weller 2Lisa M. Durso Lisa M. Durso 3Mark Bagley Mark Bagley 1Benjamin C. Davis Benjamin C. Davis 1Jonathan G. Frye Jonathan G. Frye 3Christopher J. Grim Christopher J. Grim 4Abasiofiok M. Ibekwe Abasiofiok M. Ibekwe 3Michael A. Jahne Michael A. Jahne 1Scott P. Keely Scott P. Keely 1Autumn L. Kraft Autumn L. Kraft 3Betty R. McConn Betty R. McConn 3Richard M. Mitchell Richard M. Mitchell 5Andrea R. Ottesen Andrea R. Ottesen 6Manan Sharma Manan Sharma 3Errol A. Strain Errol A. Strain 4Daniel A. Tadesse Daniel A. Tadesse 6Heather Tate Heather Tate 6Jim E. Wells Jim E. Wells 3Clinton F. Williams Clinton F. Williams 7Kimberly L. Cook Kimberly L. Cook 3Claudine Kabera Claudine Kabera 6Patrick F. McDermott Patrick F. McDermott 6Jay L. Garland Jay L. Garland 1
  • 1 Office of Research and Development, United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Research Triangle Park, United States
  • 2 Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), Atlanta, Georgia, United States
  • 3 Agricultural Research Service, United States Department of Agriculture, Washington D.C., District of Columbia, United States
  • 4 United States Food and Drug Administration, Silver Spring, Maryland, United States
  • 5 United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Washington, District of Columbia, United States
  • 6 Center for Veterinary Medicine, United States Food and Drug Administration, Laurel, Maryland, United States
  • 7 Agriculture Research Service, United States Department of Agriculture, Maricopa, AZ, United States

The final, formatted version of the article will be published soon.

    Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a world-wide public health threat that is projected to lead to 10 million annual deaths globally by 2050. The AMR public health issue has led to the development of action plans to combat AMR, including improved antimicrobial stewardship, development of new antimicrobials, and advanced monitoring. The National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System (NARMS) led by the United States (U.S) Food and Drug Administration along with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and U.S. Department of Agriculture has monitored antimicrobial resistant bacteria in retail meats, humans, and food animals since the mid 1990’s. NARMS is currently exploring an integrated One Health monitoring model recognizing that human, animal, plant, and environmental systems are linked to public health. Since 2020, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has led an interagency NARMS environmental working group (EWG) to implement a surface water AMR monitoring program (SWAM) at watershed and national scales. The NARMS EWG divided the development of the environmental monitoring effort into five areas: (i) defining objectives and questions, (ii) designing study/sampling design, (iii) selecting AMR indicators, (iv) establishing analytical methods, and (v) developing data management/analytics/metadata plans. For each of these areas, the consensus among the scientific community and literature was reviewed and carefully considered prior to the development of this environmental monitoring program. The data produced from the SWAM effort will help develop robust surface water monitoring programs with the goal of assessing public health risks associated with AMR pathogens in surface water (e.g., recreational water exposures), provide a comprehensive picture of how resistant strains are related spatially and temporally within a watershed, and help assess how anthropogenic drivers and intervention strategies impact the transmission of AMR within human, animal, and environmental systems.

    Keywords: antimicrobial resistance, Surface waters, Monitoring, One Health, freshwater, environment, Human health

    Received: 20 Dec 2023; Accepted: 29 Mar 2024.

    Copyright: © 2024 Franklin, Weller, Durso, Bagley, Davis, Frye, Grim, Ibekwe, Jahne, Keely, Kraft, McConn, Mitchell, Ottesen, Sharma, Strain, Tadesse, Tate, Wells, Williams, Cook, Kabera, McDermott and Garland. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License (CC BY). The use, distribution or reproduction in other forums is permitted, provided the original author(s) or licensor are credited and that the original publication in this journal is cited, in accordance with accepted academic practice. No use, distribution or reproduction is permitted which does not comply with these terms.

    * Correspondence: Alison M. Franklin, Office of Research and Development, United States Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), Research Triangle Park, United States

    Disclaimer: All claims expressed in this article are solely those of the authors and do not necessarily represent those of their affiliated organizations, or those of the publisher, the editors and the reviewers. Any product that may be evaluated in this article or claim that may be made by its manufacturer is not guaranteed or endorsed by the publisher.