Campaign Kickoff: Maryland Campaign to Keep Antibiotics Working

(Reposted from the Maryland Campaign to Keep Antibiotics Working)

We had a great turn out for the Kick Off Meeting of our Campaign to Keep Antibiotics Working at the beautiful American Brewery Building in Baltimore. The calamitous thunderstorm that shook and flickered the lights underscored the seriousness of the problem we’re working to solve.

Fifty people representing diverse stakeholders actively joined in the discussions: academics, doctors, nurses, business folks, environmental groups, public health organizations, unions, citizen groups, and many more.

Senator Paul Pinsky and Senator Shirley Nathan-Pulliam accepted awards for standing up for Marylanders’ health in fighting to save antibiotics and then shared their thoughts on the keys to succeeding next session.

One of the few physicians in the Maryland General Assembly, Delegate Clarence Lam, and Dr. Chris Heaney from Johns Hopkins School of Public Health educated us all on the medical antibiotic resistance crisis and shed light on the growing science connecting the farm uses to our communities.

Michael Berger from Elevation Burger and Gina Navarro with the University of Maryland’s Center for Integrative Medicine illuminated the crowd on their unique perspectives on this issue.

We had very productive breakout sessions, developed creative ideas for outreach and action items to follow up.

It was great to see so much information sharing and collaboration and strategy discussions.

There is much more work to do in the coming months, and it was great to see that there are so many hands on deck ready to dive in!

Thanks to everyone who participated in our kick off meeting. We are excited for the great things that are coming!