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Tufts University School of Medicine Dean and Levy CIMAR Founding Director Helen Boucher, MD, joined congressional policymakers, federal policymakers, and other stakeholders interested in addressing drug-resistant infections and antimicrobial resistance (AMR) for an expert panel discussion at Duke University. The panel discussed topics including the current and future threat of drug-resistant infections and antimicrobial resistance, market uncertainties that complicate antimicrobial development and commercialization, and existing and proposed incentives for novel antimicrobials, including the PASTEUR Act.

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The Levy CIMAR hosted 73 students from Boston-area Brockton High School last week for a scientific poster session where the students presented their unique findings after surveilling antimicrobial resistant (AMR) bugs in their own backyards and around Brockton, and culturing them in the lab. The findings the students presented are part of the Tiny Earth project, a research course originally designed by University of Wisconsin-Madison faculty for college students to discover antibiotics from soil bacteria. Brockton is the first public high school in the country to adopt the curriculum.

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As student researchers in Lab Science Investigations: Antimicrobial Resistance, high schoolers will have a uniquely immersive experience with the One Health approach that recognizes that the health of people is closely connected to the health of animals and our shared environment. In the case of AMR, excessive use of antibiotics in agriculture, animals, and people, all contribute to this problem.. To address this, as part of the STEM Research Institute, students will hear perspectives from experts in many fields and will work with laboratory research techniques used by engineers, social scientists, biomedical scientists, veterinarians, physicians, drug developers, epidemiologists, healthcare policy experts, and environmental scientists, who work together at the Tufts Levy Center for Integrated Management of Antimicrobial Resistance (CIMAR).

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The Levy CIMAR has been awarded a $5.15 million grant from the National Institutes of Health to construct a new biomedical research facility in the Biomedical Research and Public Health Building on the Tufts Health Sciences campus in Boston. The Laboratory for Combinatorial Drug Regimen Design for Resistant and Emerging Pathogens (LCDRD) will provide a modern, centralized laboratory and collaboration space for the Levy CIMAR’s multi-institutional effort to generate novel drug therapies for known and emerging pathogens resistant to current therapies. The new facility will be shared by teams of interdisciplinary researchers from seven Tufts University schools, including the School of Medicine, and Tufts Medicine, as well as collaborators from other regional and national institutions.

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Respiratory illnesses are making the rounds just in time for the holiday season. But after several years apart, families are ready to gather again. With Flu, COVID and RSV all circulating, doctors caution any gathering requires thought and preparation, CBS News reports. \u0022I think it’s really all about your tolerance for risk. There is no such thing as a risk-free gathering,\u0022 said Dr. Helen Boucher, Dean of Tufts Medical School and the Chief Academic Officer of Tufts Health. According to Dr. Boucher, the best thing you can do for your family right now is get the flu vaccine and latest COVID booster.

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Levy CIMAR Founding Director Dr. Helen Boucher, an expert in infectious disease and antimicrobial resistance, has been named the new dean of Tufts University School of Medicine. The first woman to lead the School of Medicine in its 129-year history, with this appointment Boucher builds on a 20-year career at Tufts as a clinician, professor, administrator, and researcher. She had served as the school’s dean ad interim since last summer, when she was also named chief academic officer for Tufts Medicine, which is the parent health system of Tufts Medical Center, the School of Medicine’s principal teaching-hospital affiliate.

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Antibiotics save lives, but whenever they are used, they can also contribute to the development of antimicrobial-resistant (AMR) infections, making antibiotics and similar drugs ineffective against the microorganisms they were created to fight. Infections of all kinds—tuberculosis, dental infections, HIV, sexually transmitted infections, COVID-19, and more—are common in jails and prisons, making these facilities places where antibiotics are frequently prescribed. Unfortunately, sometimes antibiotics are prescribed even though they are not clinically indicated, the wrong antibiotics are prescribed, or antibiotics are prescribed for too long.

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Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University (Cummings School) is now recruiting canine patients for a clinical trial testing a 3-day antibiotic treatment for urinary tract infections (UTI). According to an organizational release, researchers in this study are conducting a randomized, placebo-controlled trial to determine if 3 days of the antibiotic amoxicillin is as effective as 7 days for the treatment of UTIs in dogs. The researchers at the Cummings School are hoping if the results verify to be effective, the new treatment course could improve antibiotic compliance, reduce the development of antibiotic-resistant UTIs, make treatment easier for owners, and save money on prescription costs. UTIs are commonly seen in dogs, especially in females.

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Imagine you have 20 new compounds that have shown some effectiveness in treating a disease like tuberculosis (TB), which affects 10 million people worldwide and kills 1.5 million each year. You know that to treat the disease effectively, patients will need a combination of three or four drugs because TB bacteria behave differently in different environments—and in some cases, evolve to become drug-resistant. How do you decide which drugs to test together? Twenty compounds in three- and four-drug combinations offer nearly 6,000 possible combinations.

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The ripple effects of the Covid-19 pandemic’s influence on nearly every aspect of health in America are becoming clear. Covid-19 has killed more than one million people in the U.S., a toll mounting by some 350 people a day. A range of other chronic diseases and acute threats to health also worsened during the pandemic, data show, as people missed screenings, abandoned routines and experienced loss and isolation. Per the Levy CIMAR’s own Helen Boucher, MD, Dean ad Interim of the Tufts University School of Medicine, antibiotics, strained resources, and a slip in prevention efforts have led to a rise in resistant infections. Experts say that heart disease and drug overdoses are also among afflictions exacting a higher toll than before.

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The Tufts University Springboard Award, sponsored by by the Office of the Provost, Office of the Vice Provost for Research (OVPR), and Tufts Medical Center, has a new round of winners. Per the Springboard team, \u0022Each of these high-quality, high-impact research, scholarship, and educational initiatives bodes well for vibrant research at Tufts by having an explicit plan leading to extramural funding or other outcomes that further influence research, scholarship, and/or policy.\u0022 Congratulations to all of the winners, and especially to the Levy CIMAR’s own Drs. Alysse Wurcel (TMC), Gabriela Andujar-Vazquez (TMC), Maureen Campion (TMC), Shira Doron (TMC), and Elena Naumova (Friedman), and their colleagues for their important work. Dr. Wurcel and team have been awarded the Springboard prize for their project on \u0022Engaging Stakeholders in New England to Improve Antibiotic Stewardship Practices in Jails and Prisons.\u0022 Dr. Naumova and colleagues won the award for their work on \u0022Famine Archive and Data Hackathons.\u0022