In the acclaimed documentary “Resistance Fighters - The Global Antibiotics Crisis” (2019), Michael Wech and the team around producer Leopold Hoesch tackled the causes of antibiotic resistance and the far-reaching significance of the problem in the style of a scientific thriller. With SILENT PANDEMIC, they now continue the story and once again name the problem, but this time they mainly take a look at the search for solutions. They show how countries, scientists and private initiatives around the world are networking and forming alliances, and what strategies and measures they are using to counter the advance of antibiotic resistance. Much has happened since the UN resolution in 2016: Almost all countries have activated national action plans to combat resistance since then, foundations and NGOs have launched projects and measures in poorly developed countries and achieved initial, promising successes. And even on the most controversial issue, the use of antibiotics in animal farming, there are initial successes, as poultry producers in the USA have found ways to continue their production on a large scale without antibiotics.

SILENT PANDEMIC also focuses on the successes achieved so far in the fight against antibiotic resistance: Scientists in Uganda used the simplest of means to set up a monitoring system that can detect tuberculosis diseases ten times faster than before; in Pakistan, three female scientists succeeded in containing the outbreak of resistant typhus pathogens and thus preventing their worldwide spread. At the same time, the film showcases the work of the British government's special envoy on antimicrobial resistance, who is raising awareness of the continuing urgency of the problem around the world.