The U.S. Food and Drug Administration, in cooperation with the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, and the USDA's Food Safety and Inspection Service, its partners in the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System, is releasing the NARMS Strategic Plan: 2021-2025. The NARMS program examines bacteria isolated from humans (through CDC data), raw retail meats (through FDA data), and animals at slaughter (through USDA-FSIS data) to analyze and report on patterns of resistance to the most important antimicrobial agents.

Additionally, FDA is announcing that registration is now open for the 2020 Public Meeting of the National Antimicrobial Resistance Monitoring System, which will be held virtually on Oct. 13 and 14. The purpose of the NARMS Public Meeting 2020 is to share the NARMS Strategic Plan: 2021-2025 with stakeholders and to encourage discussion.

The NARMS Strategic Plan: 2021-2025 lists the program's strategic goals and objectives, as well as its challenges and opportunities. A central theme of the new NARMS Strategic Plan is One Health, which is a collaborative, multisectoral and transdisciplinary approach to health—working at the local, regional, national and global levels—with the goal of achieving optimal health outcomes recognizing the interconnection between people, animals, plants and their shared environment. In accord with the principles of One Health, NARMS is expanding its testing to include environmental water samples through a collaboration with the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and animal pathogens through collaborations with FDA's Veterinary Laboratory Investigation and Response Network and USDA's Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service. The NARMS Strategic Plan: 2021-2025 is a roadmap for NARMS activities over the next five years.

Registration is now open for the NARMS Public Meeting and will remain open through 4 p.m. ET on Sept. 22. Due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the public meeting will be held as a live virtual webcast.

Time at the meeting will be devoted to comments from the public and the FDA has opened a docket (docket number: FDA-2020-N-1764) for additional comments. Comments will be accepted starting Aug. 19. For more information and to register for the virtual public meeting, visit the 2020 NARMS Public Meeting webpage.

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