CURRENT PLEDGES: 216884
Shared Learning 2025 – Public Engagement
Organisation
One Health and Development Initiative
Project title: African Youths for AMR Communication
Project Overview
Inadequate AMR education and improper antimicrobial use persists in communities, driving AMR development and spread in Nigeria. To address these gaps, OHDI launched the African Youths for AMR Communication project, which is implemented through the Stop Superbugs Squad, to build the capacity of the next-generation AMR communicators and support them to ‘educate and advocate’ effectively during the WAAW 2024 and beyond.
This was achieved through a virtual training program for youth AMR champions on effective communication and community engagement for AMR prevention and control, and to improve their advocacy efforts during the WAAW 2024. This training was piloted with a diverse cohort of 41 champions from 28 universities across Nigeria, Cameroon, Malaysia, Rwanda and Tanzania. These champions were trained via four 1-hour sessions using the train-the-trainer approach by experienced AMR professionals and risk communicators to champion AMR education in their communities during the WAAW 2024. They were also engaged during breakout sessions to reflect on learnings for each day.
During the training, the champions were encouraged to share the acquired knowledge with other students and form a team of four. After the training, we requested that all champions submit their respective WAAW 2024 campaign ideas for review and approval. Thereafter, we supported them with risk communication materials (flyers, posters and social media infographics) co-designed with the project consultants and champions; funds for Nigerian champions according to their approved activity budget; and letters of introduction or endorsement for their intended audience, if requested.
Target audience of these champions include abattoirs, community pharmacies, markets, primary healthcare centers, radio stations, schools, social media, tertiary hospitals, universities, and veterinary clinics. They also donated posters to these institutions to be pasted on notice boards and/or fliers for clients to ensure continuous education.
Impact on tackling AMR
This Phase 1 of this project has resulted in tremendous impact.
- We trained 41 youth champions on AMR and One Health, social and behavioral theories, effective risk communication and community engagement (RCCE) strategies, gender considerations for AMR communication, audience-specific engagements, use of digital tech and new media in AMR communication, and AMR policy advocacy. These youth champions further trained and engaged 362 youth volunteers during the WAAW 2024.
- The trained champions and volunteers reached a total of 7,634,118 persons in English, French, Hausa, Igbo, Swahili and Yoruba languages via AMR dialogues abattoirs, community pharmacies, hospitals, primary healthcare centers and universities, advocacy visits, awareness rallies, social media campaigns, webinars and radio broadcasts, implemented in the 6 geopolitical zones of Nigeria, 2 districts in Cameroon and amongst Tanzanian students. They also engaged 28,063 persons physically via dialogues and awareness talks, with most of them orally pledging to take action against AMR. For example, a district head in Yola, Adamawa state was educated and he immediately started sharing the information with his community members about AMR and he pledges to continue. Similarly, the community leader of Sentu village in Ilorin, Kwara state pledged to champion AMR awareness in his community. Furthermore, in Gado Nasko – Abuja, Nigeria, we secured the commitment and pledges of over 20 community pharmacies to join the fight against AMR.
- Also, they distributed several educational materials (fliers, posters and stickers) to veterinary clinics, pharmacies, primary healthcare centers for continued education. Several healthcare professionals including doctors, nurses, pharmacists and veterinarians pledged to support actions against AMR. For example, at the Rose of Sharon specialist hospital, Nnewi – Anambra state, 20 nurses signed our pledge forms, expressing their commitment to AMR advocacy in the hospital.
Future Development
Second phase of this project is developed to engage another cohort of youths in AMR and WASH communication. In this phase, 40 Nigerian undergraduates will be trained to champion sustainable AMR education in 80 secondary schools across the six geopolitical zones of Nigeria. These champions will be trained via six 1-hour lecture sessions, breakout sessions and quizzes. Thereafter, the champions will be supported to scope for education gaps on AMR and WASH in these schools. The data obtained will be used to co-develop (with the champions and consultants) audience-specific risk communication messages to improve knowledge and change behaviours on AMR and WASH in these schools. We will also support the champions to provide local WASH aids to these schools and establish AMR clubs in the schools to facilitate behavioural changes and continued AMR education. We have received funding from The Trinity Challenge to implement this phase of the project. We also hope that this phase will be incorporated into national efforts towards improved AMR education in Nigerian secondary schools, as highlighted in the country’s National Action Plan for AMR 2.0.
Organisation
Public Health Wales
Project title: One Wales, One Health: a campaign to raise awareness of antimicrobial resistance in Wales
Project Overview
In recent years, Public Health Wales has used its convening power to bring together specialists from across human and animal health to plan, deliver and evaluate an annual campaign to coincide with World AMR Awareness Week.
The One Wales, One Health campaign seeks, first, to build public knowledge about antibiotic resistance, and second, to motivate people in Wales to take action to prevent it.
In 2024, we secured as our campaign ambassador Welsh farmer and former international rugby referee Nigel Owens.
As well as fronting the media campaign, Owens featured in two pieces of video content: one aimed at farmers and another at the general public. Both carried the same top-line message, encouraging audiences to “show antibiotic resistance the red card” by using antibiotics responsibly.
Cutdowns of Owens’ video content were a key element of our paid social media activity, which also made use of a series of 30-second animated explainer videos. These eye-catching ads, which explained clearly and simply what antibiotic resistance is and how it can be prevented, were posted on Facebook, Instagram and TikTok.
The central mission of the campaign, however, is to mobilise organisations and individuals in Wales to help build knowledge of antibiotic resistance and how to prevent it.
In 2024, this included high-profile individuals such as medical student and former Miss Wales Millie-Mae Adams who, with our guidance, produced her own digital content.
This year, too, venues across Wales lit up blue to mark World AMR Awareness Week.
We developed a library of campaign assets, including posters, digital screen images and social media content, which was shared with organisations across Wales. These partners were also encouraged to organise on-the-ground activities, from an infection-themed bake-offs to a design a microbe competitions.
Impact on tackling AMR
Our campaign shows the value of connecting professional networks within a small nation.
Indeed, the forging of new connections is one the campaign’s key outcomes. In 2024, as well as bringing together antimicrobial pharmacists from across Wales’ seven health boards, we convened experts working in other related fields, including behavioural science and public policy. The result was a campaign which was not only informed by evidence and insight but widely shared.
Our media launch saw interviews with Nigel Owens and Public Health Wales’ AMR spokesperson on ITV Wales, which reached 275,000 viewers. Our paid social media ads gained 408,000 impressions, 2,611 link clicks and 306,000 video views.
By the end of the 2024 campaign, over 1,000 assets had been downloaded from our stakeholder toolkit. This means many more would have seen campaign content shared by our partners – from posters and digital screen images in hospital and GP waiting areas to videos posted on the social media feeds of health boards, government departments and professional bodies.
Organic (non-paid) posts from Public Health Wales’ channels, which reached 22,000 people, gained 92 shares, while 418 people visited our campaign landing page.
Posts featuring campaign ambassador Nigel Owens performed particularly well. His “Show Antibiotic Resistance the Red Card” video was viewed over 20,000 times and gained 173 reactions across Instagram and Facebook.
A video from medical student and former Miss Wales Millie-Mae Adams was viewed over 7,000 times.
Many more engaged with the campaign offline. The networks formed during the planning stages of the campaign meant that a record number of landmarks in Wales followed the WHO’s plea to “Go Blue for AMR”. Over ten landmarks, among them Cardiff Bay’s Mermaid Quay, Newport’s Civic Centre, Barry’s Hood Road tunnel, Pembrokeshire’s Brynhyfryd farm and Caerphilly Castle, lit up blue and shared their reasons why.
Future Development
Ours is a multi-year campaign, coinciding with the WHO’s World AMR Awareness Week. Since the pandemic, we have built a library of campaign content that can be reused year on year. This means, in the future, we can direct our modest annual budget towards optimising the use of these assets – for example, by increasing our advertising spend – and delivering bespoke communications activity tailored to specific audiences.
In 2025, taking advantage of the connections we’ve made with our Healthy Schools Network and the Future Generations Commissioner, we will plan, deliver and evaluate some targeted communications aimed directly at primary school-age children in Wales.
This will see educational materials shared with children in schools, introducing them to antibiotic resistance, why it’s important and what we can do to prevent it. Children will then be given the opportunity to participate in an antibiotic-themed poster competition, with the winning poster being put on display in a high-profile public location. This will allow us, for the first time, to create messaging tailored to future generations.
As with every multi-year campaign we run, we use learnings from the evaluation of previous campaigns to direct our future activities. However, there is more we can do to improve how we measure and evaluate the One Health, One Wales campaign in 2025. This means taking advantage of some of the research tools available to us – for example, Public Health Wales’ health protection tracker survey – to measure campaign recall and knowledge about antibiotic resistance over time.
Our campaign proves that when we join forces as colleagues we become more than the sum of our parts. In the future, above all, we will continue to bring people together to tackle what is one of the biggest health threats we face.
Organisation
Health Innovation East
Project title: Collaborative Initiative to Educate the public on AMR/AMS: Regional Quiz Launch during WAAW 2024 in the East of England
Project Overview
This collaborative project across the East of England (EOE) adapted an evidence-based public facing quiz (published in the Journal of Antimicrobial Chemotherapy 2016). Health Innovation East (HIE), NHS England (NHSE) EOE and Cambridgeshire and Peterborough Integrated Care Board (ICB) collaborated with the Patient and Public Involvement (PPI) panel from the charity Antibiotic Research UK to update the questions.
The quiz focused on dispelling myths and clarifying key concepts related to AMR, for example how resistance develops, the dangers of improper antibiotic use, and actions individuals could take to prevent its spread. The final quiz contained 10 true/false statements that were uploaded to a digital platform. The platform included optional demographics i.e. ethnicity, gender, age-group and post-code. Once answers were submitted, detailed responses to the questions were provided to the user, with additional information and links to NHS resources. To encourage participation, a £1 donation to Antibiotic Research UK was made by HIE for each completed quiz.
The quiz was launched formally during the NHSE EOE world antimicrobial resistance (AMR) awareness week event. It was promoted to local networks and through the communication teams from the organisations involved. It was live from 18-30th November 2024.
It was accessed nearly 2000 times with a total of 576 completed responses (5760 statements). Similar to findings from the original study, gaps in knowledge on the two statements around how AMR develops and what antimicrobial stewardship involves, were identified. This suggests further efforts are required to explain AMR/AMS to the public as current materials might not provide the necessary clarity.
This project provided a digital, collaborative and cost-effective way of harnessing this year’s WAAW 2024 theme: Educate, Advocate, Act Now. The results could be used by local and national policymakers to develop future public educational campaigns on AMR/AMS addressing the gaps in knowledge identified.
Impact on tackling AMR
This project aligns to the National Action Plan for AMR 2024-2029 and specifically supports Outcome 2- Public engagement & Education and the Target 2a: by 2029 where the aim is to increase UK public and healthcare professionals’ knowledge on AMR by 10%, using 2018 and 2019 baselines, respectively. The outcomes of this initiative highlight its tangible impact on addressing AMR
1) Enhanced Public Knowledge and Awareness: By providing in-depth answers and resources upon quiz submission, we directly educated participants about AMR and AMS dispelling myths and clarifying misconceptions. The interactive format fostered engagement, ensuring nearly 600 individuals gained accurate knowledge, which could influence their personal behaviours and decision-making around antibiotic use.
2) Contribution to Behavioural Change: Educating the public on AMR/AMS will decrease patient pressure on GPs to prescribe antibiotics when not clinically indicated, contributing to an overall decrease in antibiotic consumption, thereby decreasing resistance.
3)Broad Dissemination and Potential Multiplier Effect: Our response rate means that nearly 600 individuals were eager to educate themselves and learn about AMR/AMS. Engaged participants may share insights with family, friends, or colleagues, amplifying the message. Additionally, the project provided valuable data on knowledge gaps, which can guide future educational campaigns at local and national levels.
Future Development
The project will be developed further in 2025 by updating the quiz to address identified knowledge gaps and re-launching it with a stronger communication strategy. A longer promotional timeline will help maximise participation. Continued collaboration with key partners will ensure the content remains relevant and impactful. Additionally, we plan to write a scientific paper, as the findings align with those from a decade ago, highlighting that UK public health campaigns may not be fully addressing the public’s needs in AMS education. Please note that this is preliminary unpublished data.
