CIPARS

The Canadian Integrated Program for Antimicrobial Resistance Surveillance (CIPARS) monitors trends in antimicrobial use and antimicrobial resistance in selected bacterial organisms from human, animal and food sources across Canada. The program is based on several representative and methodologically unified surveillance components which can be linked to examine the relationship between antimicrobials used in food-animals and humans and the associated health impacts. This information supports: (i) the creation of evidence-based policies to control antimicrobial use in hospital, community, and agricultural settings and thus prolong the effectiveness of these drugs, and (ii) the identification of appropriate measures to contain the emergence and spread of resistant bacteria between animals, food, and people in Canada.

CIPARS researchers work in collaboration with the team of Simon Otto and Sylvia Checkley, the AMR-One Health Consortium Principal Investigators of the “Farm-to-Fork assessment of exposure to AMR” and “Molecular epidemiology of AMR” projects:

“CIPARS researchers are developing integrated assessment models for AMR (iAM.AMR) to synthesize large volumes of disparate data to understand the risk of AMR transmission through the foodchain from animals to people. They are working on model scenarios for various food animal commodity-bacteria-antimicrobial combinations. We are working with them to develop iAM.AMR models for AMR Campylobacter and macrolide resistant enterococci, to contribute to the suite of CIPARS models. Other collaborative projects will compare other modes of risk profiling and transmission dynamics to the CIPARS iAM.AMR model for macrolide resistant enterococci, to explore the best ways to integrate surveillance and research data in different situations and for different stakeholders, to achieve a robust investigation of a variety of questions. Comparative genomics and molecular epidemiologic techniques will be used to investigate the relatedness of the bacteria, mobile genetic elements and antimicrobial resistant genes a broad group of enterococci and E. coli isolates from a broad selection of sources (poultry, cow-calf, feedlots operations, retails meats, well water and surface water) collected through CIPARS surveillance and related research projects. This also provides information to populate the CIPARS models. We are also working closely with CIPARS and PHAC to conduct a traditional QMRA for fluoroquinolone-resistant Campylobacter from poultry. We will use data, model frameworks and in-kind resources from CIPARS and their genomic data funded under the Genomic Research Development Initiative to contribute to the development of our model scenarios.”

For more information on CIPARS, visit their website below.