Alongside the launch of NIAMR on 5 June 2026 at the Protea Hotel, Kampala, the project held its First National Community Engagement and Involvement (CEI). The purpose was simple and deliberate: before building a national AMR data platform, hear from the people who generate and use that data.
What transpired
After the official launch and a project overview from the research team, participants moved into four sector breakout rooms, each co-moderated by NIAMR / HIRI researchers:
- Human Health Sector — patients & stakeholders
- Animal Health Sector & Wildlife — farmers, UWA & stakeholders
- Environmental Health Sector — NEMA & stakeholders
- One Health / cross-cutting — UWA & cross-sector stakeholders
Each room worked through a structured set of questions — on current AMR data management and use, the challenges of capture, integration and sharing, what the platform should provide, and how to build trust, governance and sustainability. Participants captured their thinking on sticky notes; a community member also shared lived experiences of antimicrobial resistance with the research team. The rooms then came together in a plenary to consolidate voices, platform requirements and next steps.
What follows is a transcription of those contributions, grouped into five themes, in the participants' own words.
1. Data systems in use today
National systems (NDA system, IRIMS, eIDSR, ePHEM); pharmacy & retail records (prescription books, sales records, private pharmacy systems); records & registers (VHT, KCCA, log books, waste-handler records); and research tools (KoboCollect, Chime Master, research databases). The NDA system was cited as the most effective.
2. Who uses AMR data
Global & regulatory bodies (WHO, CDC, NDA, NMS & JMS, biostatisticians); industry & innovators (manufacturers, diagnostic companies, investors); community & frontline (VHTs, herbalists, farmers, communities); decision-makers (policymakers, donors, line ministries, journalists); and health-care & surveillance actors (hospitals, pharmacies, procurement, surveillance and emergency-response teams).
3. Frictions, risks and trust
Mistrust between actors and unacknowledged recognition; poor governance, missing legal frameworks and no data-sharing agreements; non-integrated, fragmented, incomplete or "dirty" data with low provenance; and fragile infrastructure (analog storage, limited digital capacity, cyber-security risks). A recurring reason data is not shared: suppression when findings affect a company, bureaucratic access, and no acknowledgement of data owners.
4. Missing data sources
Human health: sick bays, clinics, drug shops, self-medicating households, VHTs. Animal & food: slaughterhouses, wildlife (UWA), dairy & meat retailers, food handlers, agrochemical shops. Environment: wastewater & cesspools, water reservoirs, local brewers, environmental sites. Labs & other: diagnostic & QA laboratories, MCBI/NCBI databases, meteorological centres, traditional healers — plus paper tools to digitise (stock cards, dispensing logs, requisition vouchers).
5. Life without NIAMR
Participants were clear about the cost of inaction: rising AMR, more infections and higher mortality; persistent data silos and poor-quality data; a slower, weaker response; and economic harm. In their words — without the platform, the country keeps every data challenge, and the AMR curve rises unchecked, with no shared picture to act on.
The hard questions participants raised
Participants were candid about digitising sensitive data: consent and data sovereignty (and the right to revoke it), accountability when an automated system misclassifies a person or place, resilience when the internet or power is down, and making sure the platform preserves dignity and trust rather than reducing people to statistics. These are now part of NIAMR's governance and design agenda.
What happens with this input
These contributions feed directly into NIAMR's implementation roadmap and platform requirements, and into the project's first phase — a national situation analysis and baseline assessment of AMR data in Uganda.
Full engagement report
The formal, citable engagement report is being finalised and will be published on the NIAMR Outputs hub.
