From Performative Alignment to Feasible Action: Pathways for Implementing AMR Interventions in Brazil's SUS

• Grant number: 25/28760-6
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships abroad - Research Internship - Post-doctor
• Start date: April 01, 2026
• End date: March 31, 2027
• Field of knowledge: Health Sciences - Collective Health - Public Health
• Principal Investigator: Elize Massard da Fonseca
• Grantee: Juliana Silva Corrêa
• Supervisor: Clare Chandler
• Host Institution: Escola de Administração de Empresas de São Paulo (EAESP). Fundação Getúlio Vargas (FGV). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Institution abroad: London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, England
• Associated to the scholarship: 25/02643-3 - Brazil's Response to Antimicrobial Resistance: Challenges and Strategies for the SUS, BP.PD

Abstract

This project examines why national responses to antimicrobial resistance (AMR) remain limited despite strong global commitments. It argues that the persistent implementation gap is not merely a failure of execution but a predictable outcome of a global governance model that promotes technically demanding and multisectoral frameworks far beyond the institutional capacities of most countries. Findings from the first year of this postdoctoral research show that Brazil exemplifies this tension. Although it adopted a comprehensive, One Health-oriented National Action Plan aligned with WHO expectations, AMR governance has remained weakly anchored in the Unified Health System (SUS), characterised by fragmented coordination, low political authority, and the dominance of a narrow technical coalition. The result is a largely performative policy response. Brazil signals compliance with global norms without generating the conditions required for substantive implementation.The one-year internship at the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine (LSHTM) will consolidate and deepen the project's analytical direction. During preliminary discussions, Professor Clare Chandler helped frame the Brazilian findings through the lens of performativity and the circulation of global health norms. The internship will refine this theoretical approach, draw comparative insights from the United Kingdom as an analytical reference case, and apply evidence-informed frameworks to identify which AMR interventions could be realistically institutionalised within Brazil's federal health system. Expected outputs include two co-authored publications and the co-development of a joint FAPESP-UKRI Young Investigator proposal to establish an AMR Policy & Social Science research group at FGV EAESP, expanding long-term UK-Brazil collaboration. (AU)