PROTEA Study: investigating the intersection of socioeconomic and cultural drivers on antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and its influence on healthcare access and health-providing behaviors in India and South Africa

Overview: 

This Wellcome-funded research, co-authored by the One Health Trust, explores how social factors including gender, socioeconomic status, race, and class influence people’s access to healthcare and health behaviors related to infections, including antibiotic use. By exploring these dynamics, the researchers aim to create effective infection prevention and control (IPC) and antimicrobial stewardship (AMS) strategies to help curb the spread of antimicrobial resistance (AMR). 

The Question: 

How do social and economic factors affect people’s access to healthcare and their use of antibiotics for infection-related issues and how do these influences differ in South Africa, an upper-middle-income country, compared to India, a lower-middle-income country, and what might context-specific IPC and AMS strategies look like that address these social influences? 

The Findings: 

Social and economic factors strongly impact how people access and experience healthcare and use antibiotics. The study findings, guided by a theory of change model, reveal that these influences extend beyond IPC and AMS, highlighting how systems can create barriers to equitable healthcare for marginalized communities. By understanding how gender, socioeconomic status, race, and class intersect to shape healthcare access, the researchers identified ways to break down these barriers. Their findings can aid in developing targeted interventions and policy changes to support fairer, more inclusive healthcare systems, addressing larger issues of health equity. 

Read the article in Wellcome Open Research here.