BEYOND RESISTANCE COLLOQUIUM: REIMAGINING AMR BEYOND THE MILITARY METAPHOR

The 2019 Beyond Resistance Colloquium was held at the Edinburgh Centre for Carbon Innovation on the 11th of January where researchers, practitioners and experts from over 25 disciplines gathered in response to the provocation:

The language we use to frame our relationship with microbes has profound effects. ‘Crises’ are imminent with the rise of microbial resistance; we face a looming ‘apocalypse’ as the antibiotics fail to work; we ‘fight’ disease, and structure public health campaigns around ‘military style’ campaigns. As we divide microbes into those that are friendly, and those ‘superbugs’ that are ‘enemies’ we barely think of the impact that this language has. Yet we as humans we are comprised of viruses, bacteria and fungi such that our bodies are inseparable from these. This way we understand human-microbe relations has had profound effects; but as the antibiotic era draws to an end, we now need new ways of reconceptualising our relationship with microbes.

Through a series of presentations addressing language and microbes from a diverse range of disciplines – social sciences, the arts, microbiologists, veterinary scientists, ecologists, economists, philosophers – the discussion centred around how we frame our understanding of human-microbe relations. Can we reimagine this relationship otherwise?

Sarah Craske, Ebb and Flow of Disease.

To finish the colloquium, Sarah Craske a multi-award winning British artist, whose work explores the intersection of Art, Science & Technology gave a fascinating talk about her recent work at ETH. The image below, Disease Map was created whilst Craske was Biofaction’s Artist in Residence at the Department of Biosystems Science and Engineering at ETH Zurich (D-BSSE), with support from Prof. Dr. Sven Panke, the Basel Pharmacy Museum and SPACER.

Sarah Craske, The Disease Map 2018

Time-lapse Film of Vibrio cholerae Interacting With Synthetic Peptides Across a Map of Basel by Matthäus Merian

Sarah Craske’s work The Disease Map (2018)  is a time-lapse film of Vibrio Cholerae interacting with synthetic peptides across a map of Basel by Matthäus Merian. Craske’s work invites use to consider the disease map as both an epidemiological tool throughout history and also the ebb and flow of human pathogen interactions over time. Craske addresses antibiotic resistance directly, using an antibiotic substance to suggest the limits of human disease control and highlight the ways humans create conditions for disease to flourish. The disease map an alternative conception of our understanding of disease away from military metaphors by understanding disease in Basel within historical patterns which create the conditions for the emergence of pathogens and means to counter them.

“The ebb and flow of health crises versus the successful creation of viable antibiotics is increasing in speed and the pressure is mounting on scientists to arrive at a novel solution to reduce the global threat of antibiotic resistance. In this installation Craske re-presents the disease map; a tool that is still used to this day by the World Health Organisation to present data on the spread of infection. A time-lapse film records the spread of cholera across Basel, and it’s interaction with her synthetic peptides.”

From Sarah Craske’s website http://www.sarahcraske.co.uk/theriak-the-disease-map/ 2019.

In three words, participants described the colloquium as…

Inspiring challenging collaborative

Fascinating, diverse, necessary

interesting, exploratory, inspiring

thought-provoking, diverse, open

interesting, stimulating, fun

Stimulating, thought provoking, well organised

A good move

Stimulating, interesting, well-organised

thought provoking, multidisciplinary

…and found it valuable because…

Looking at AMR from different perspective – beyond the disease focus/ the power of words

A greater appreciation of the diversity of positions on the issue, and the need for greater cross disciplinary dialogue

Increased awareness of language used in day to day life

This especially informed me on where military messaging comes from and social contexts for the way we talk about and regard AMR.

Greater awareness of our entangled and complex inter-dependencies

It has made me more critical of the language I use to talk about disease.