Antimicrobial medicines consumption

The WHO Global Action Plan on Antimicrobial Resistance recognizes the importance of collecting and analysing data on antibiotic use as a means of identifying potential overuse, underuse and inappropriate use of antimicrobial medicines, and as a basis for developing interventions to address inappropriate practices.

Surveillance of antimicrobial consumption (AMC) has been undertaken by all countries of the European Union (EU), as well as Iceland and Norway, via the European Surveillance of Antimicrobial Consumption Network (ESAC-Net) since 1997. The European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC) now coordinates this work.

However, surveillance of AMC in the non-EU Member States of the WHO European Region has not been systematic. To address this, WHO/Europe established the WHO AMC Network in 2011 to assist countries in setting up or strengthening national AMC surveillance and to contribute to Region-wide AMC surveillance.