As reported earlier, AAs from the macrolide class were well observed in the river Avon, and the ARG conferring resistance to macrolides ermB was also quantified in the same sample, at 6.01E+04 ± 3.62E+04 copies/L. However, it should be noted that absence of an AA in the environment could indicate a high prevalence of resistance in the bacterial communities . Whilst complexities lie in discerning linkages between AA presence and ARGs in environmental matrices, monitoring of both AAs and ARGs will be key for understanding the scope and scale of the problem. It is already considered that there could be a shift in surveillance in future environmental risk assessments; for example, resistance genes monitoring in soils has been proposed by the European commission (European Commision, 2020).