Nigeria has recorded significant gains in antimicrobial stewardship across 17 health facilities under the Commonwealth Partnerships for Antimicrobial Stewardship (CwPAMS) programme.
Pharm. Estelle Mbadiwe, Founding Partner at Ducit Blue Solutions, the in-country coordinating organization for CwPAMS, disclosed this in an interview with reporters on Thursday in Abuja.
Mbadiwe said the progress recorded under the programme had prompted stakeholders to call for its integration into Nigeria’s national health system.
She listed the participating facilities to include the University of Calabar Teaching Hospital, operating at the Comprehensive Health Centre, Okoyong; University College Hospital (UCH), Ibadan; University of Nigeria Teaching Hospital (UNTH), Ituku-Ozalla; and Babcock University Teaching Hospital.
Others are the College of Medicine, University of Lagos (CMUL); Lagos State University Teaching Hospital (LASUTH); and CMUL operating at the Palm Avenue Primary Health Centre. She added that the UK Lead, Sheffield Teaching Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust, and other partners provided technical support and expertise across all sites.
According to Mbadiwe, the three-year programme delivered major improvements in governance, data quality, medicine use and community awareness, while supporting Nigeria’s National Action Plan on Antimicrobial Resistance (AMR).
“CwPAMS has delivered critical gains in antimicrobial stewardship over the past three years. What we are now discussing is how these gains can be absorbed into Nigeria’s national mechanisms,” she said.
She explained that antimicrobial stewardship ensures medicines used to treat infections—such as antibiotics and antifungals—remain effective as bacteria and other pathogens evolve.
“Drugs that used to work are no longer effective, and this threatens quality healthcare.
“This programme has helped Nigeria build systems, skills and strategies to combat resistance, while also creating platforms for bilateral learning with UK health institutions,” Mbadiwe said.
The pharmacist highlighted key achievements of the programme to include the development of facility-level guidelines for managing AMR, improved data quality, medicine-use reviews, strengthened leadership and governance structures, and enhanced community awareness.
She said the programme had been aligned with Nigeria’s National Action Plan on AMR through close collaboration with the Nigeria Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (NCDC).
Mbadiwe also noted increased funding for AMR activities in several states and stressed the need to sustain the hub-and-spoke mentorship model, community pharmacy engagement and facility-based data systems beyond the lifespan of the project.
“Ducit Blue Solutions will continue to visit participating health facilities to conduct monitoring and evaluation activities to ensure that the gains recorded under the programme are sustained.
“We must sustain what we have built—community engagement, capacity building, data-driven decision-making and awareness creation. These efforts should continue and be expanded,” she said.
Describing AMR as a “silent pandemic,” Mbadiwe urged Nigerians to take collective responsibility by understanding the drivers of resistance and promoting responsible use of medicines.
CwPAMS is jointly managed by the Commonwealth Pharmacists Association (CPA) and Global Health Partnerships (GHP, formerly THET), with Ducit Blue Solutions and the NCDC serving as in-country grants managers in Nigeria.
The programme is funded by the UK Department of Health and Social Care through the Fleming Fund and is designed to combat antimicrobial resistance globally by strengthening health systems and antimicrobial stewardship.
Key focus areas of CwPAMS include improving antimicrobial stewardship and surveillance, building antimicrobial pharmacy expertise, strengthening infection prevention and control, and improving the use of clinical microbiology and prescribing data to support better clinical decisions and detect substandard or falsified antimicrobial medicines.
