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Making Use of Existing International Legal Mechanisms to Manage the Global Antimicrobial Commons: Identifying Legal Hooks and Institutional Mandates.

Authors
  • Rogers Van Katwyk, Susan1, 2
  • Weldon, Isaac1, 3
  • Giubilini, Alberto4, 5
  • Kirchhelle, Claas4, 6
  • Harrison, Mark4, 6
  • McLean, Angela4, 7
  • Savulescu, Julian4, 8
  • Hoffman, Steven J9, 10, 11, 12, 13
  • 1 Global Strategy Lab, Dahdaleh Institute for Global Health Research, Faculty of Health and Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, 4700 Keele Street, Dahdaleh Building 2120, Toronto, ON, M3J 1P3, Canada. , (Canada)
  • 2 School of Epidemiology and Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada. , (Canada)
  • 3 Department of Politics, York University, Toronto, Canada. , (Canada)
  • 4 Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.
  • 5 Wellcome Centre for Ethics and Humanities, Oxford, UK.
  • 6 Wellcome Unit for the History of Medicine, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.
  • 7 Department of Zoology, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.
  • 8 Oxford Uehiro Centre for Practical Ethics, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK.
  • 9 Global Strategy Lab, Dahdaleh Institute for Global Health Research, Faculty of Health and Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, 4700 Keele Street, Dahdaleh Building 2120, Toronto, ON, M3J 1P3, Canada. [email protected]. , (Canada)
  • 10 School of Epidemiology and Public Health, Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada. [email protected]. , (Canada)
  • 11 Oxford Martin School, University of Oxford, Oxford, UK. [email protected].
  • 12 Department of Global Health and Population, Harvard T H Chan School of Public Health, Harvard University, Boston, MA, USA. [email protected].
  • 13 Department of Health Research Methods, Evidence, and Impact and McMaster Health Forum, McMaster University, Hamilton, Canada. [email protected]. , (Canada)
Type
Published Article
Journal
Health care analysis : HCA : journal of health philosophy and policy
Publication Date
Mar 01, 2023
Volume
31
Issue
1
Pages
9–24
Identifiers
DOI: 10.1007/s10728-020-00393-y
PMID: 32236833
Source
Medline
Keywords
Language
English
License
Unknown

Abstract

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is an urgent threat to global public health and development. Mitigating this threat requires substantial short-term action on key AMR priorities. While international legal agreements are the strongest mechanism for ensuring collaboration among countries, negotiating new international agreements can be a slow process. In the second article in this special issue, we consider whether harnessing existing international legal agreements offers an opportunity to increase collective action on AMR goals in the short-term. We highlight ten AMR priorities and several strategies for achieving these goals using existing "legal hooks" that draw on elements of international environmental, trade and health laws governing related matters that could be used as they exist or revised to include AMR. We also consider the institutional mandates of international authorities to highlight areas where additional steps could be taken on AMR without constitutional changes. Overall, we identify 37 possible mechanisms to strengthen AMR governance using the International Health Regulations, the Agreement on the Application of Sanitary and Phytosanitary Measures, the Agreement on Trade-Related Aspects of Intellectual Property Rights, the Agreement on Technical Barriers to Trade, the International Convention on the Harmonized Commodity Description and Coding System, and the Basel, Rotterdam, and Stockholm conventions. Although we identify many shorter-term opportunities for addressing AMR using existing legal hooks, none of these options are capable of comprehensively addressing all global governance challenges related to AMR, such that they should be pursued simultaneously with longer-term approaches including a dedicated international legal agreement on AMR. © 2020. The Author(s).

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