Canada has an opportunity to address antimicrobial resistance through COVID-19 recovery spending.

Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR) causes more than a million deaths globally per year due to infections incurable with currently available antibiotics. Failing to effectively address AMR will have significant negative consequences for Canadians and the Canadian economy. Canada is behind on allocation of required funding and nationally coordinated AMR mitigation strategies relative to other high-income countries. A Pan-Canadian AMR action plan and development of a new governance model is pending. Recent AMR-specific funding commitments are significant but fall short while distribution of funds indicate a siloed approach. Canada could initiate progress towards AMR mitigation through incorporation within the scope of budget allocations intended for COVID-19 recovery and mitigation efforts. We discuss the following components for inclusion: development of infectious disease diagnostics and therapeutics; antimicrobial stewardship interventions in long-term care and Indigenous communities; environmental monitoring of AMR; comprehensive antimicrobial use, and AMR surveillance; and support for capacity-building in low and middle-income countries.

Gonorrhoea resurgence in Canada.

After several years of decline, reported gonorrhoea rates in Canada have recently increased substantially. National goals for gonorrhoea control were developed in 1997, but it appears that reliance on secular trends is insufficient to attain the goal of eliminating locally transmitted infection by Neisseria gonorrhoeae by 2010. We have examined disease surveillance reports from 1994 to 2001 inclusive to assess demographic and epidemiologic trends in reported cases of gonococcal infection. Since 1997, reported cases have increased by 53% among men and 33% among women. The largest proportion of cases in women is in those aged 15-24; the most dramatic increase in males has been among those aged 30-39. Reasons for the resurgence remain unclear, but disease reports indicate that renewed attention to enhanced surveillance and targeted prevention are essential for gonorrhoea control in Canada.