FDI World Dental Federation and the International Association for Dental Research (IADR) welcome WHO’s priorities to address drug-resistant bacterial infections. Dentists prescribe up to 10% of all outpatient antibiotics in human healthcare globally, playing a vital role in preventing drug-resistant oral infections and reducing antibiotic usage. FDI`s Global AMR Research in Dentistry (GARD) network supports dental ABR research, and we have long advocated for dentists to be an integral part of multi-sectoral national action plans on antimicrobial resistance.

We urge member states to integrate dentistry into evidence-based treatment guidelines and antimicrobial stewardship programmes, emphasizing prevention, the provision of essential oral health services at the primary healthcare level, and prioritizing research to complete our understanding of AMR. FDI and IADR can provide core metrics for evaluating antibiotic stewardship in dentistry and data on countries tackling ABR in dentistry.