Using coffee husks as waste material for bedding contributes to sustainable development. A sustainable choice of bedding has also, however, to be a safe choice for poultry. The study analysed immune-related gene expression in the intestinal mucosa and indicator bacteria in caecal content collected from broiler chickens bedded on material with coffee husk addition.

Antimicrobial (AM) resistance is a growing threat in human and veterinary medicine, spreading across species and perceived as One-Health issue. Prudent use of AM products is essential in mitigating this risk in both human and veterinary medicine. Farm veterinarians, responsible for prescribing appropriate AM and offering advice to farmers on their proper usage, are regarded as key players in the livestock industry. An online survey of farm veterinarians (n = 1,531) was conducted to assess their educational experience, beliefs, current status of prescription, practical behavior, and self-efficacy regarding the prudent use of antimicrobials (PUA). The data from 170 respondents were analyzed using descriptive statistics, regression and mediation analysis. Participants chose AM based on their experiences, academic resources, and peer veterinarians. Approximately 77% did not routinely conduct antibiotic-susceptibility-test. Most participants believed in the importance of PUA and the role of veterinarians to reduce AM resistance, but they reported a lack of awareness among farmers and insufficient national support interfere with their practical behavior with regard to PUA. Half of the participants had PUA-education, and 78.6% reported that education had a positive impact on their behavior with PUA. Self-efficacy partly mediates the relationship between belief and behavior for PUA, which accounted for 23.77% of the total effect that beliefs have on behavior for PUA. The findings of the study show that enhancing veterinarians’ abilities to practice and their self-efficacy through education tailored to the current status of farms can contribute to the reduction of AMs in the livestock sector.

The first known severe disease caused by a coronavirus (CoV) in humans emerged with the severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS) epidemic in China, which killed 774 people during its 2002/2003 outbreak. The Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) was the second human fatal disease, which started in 2012 in Saudi Arabia and resulted in 858 fatalities. In December 2019, a new virus, SARS-CoV-2 (COVID-19), originating from China, began generating headlines worldwide because of the unprecedented speed of its transmission; 5.2 million people were infected and 338 480 had been reported dead from December 2019 to May 2020. These human coronaviruses are believed to have an animal origin and had reached humans through species jump. Coronaviruses are well known for their high frequency of recombination and high mutation rates, allowing them to adapt to new hosts and ecological niches. This review summarises existing information on what is currently known on the role of wild and domesticated animals and discussions on whether they are the natural reservoir/amplifiers hosts or incidental hosts of CoVs. Results of experimental infection and transmission using different wild, domesticated and pet animals are also reviewed. The need for a One Health approach in implementing measures and practices is highlighted to improve human health and reduce the emergence of pandemics from these zoonotic viruses.

Advocacy for neglected zoonotic diseases (ADVANZ) is a One Health Neglected Zoonotic Diseases (NZDs) project, funded by the European Commission through its 7th framework programme. The initiative aims at persuading decision makers and empowering stakeholders at local, regional, and international levels towards a coordinated fight against NZDs. ADVANZ is establishing an African platform to share experiences in the prevention and control of NZDs. The platform will compile and package existing knowledge or data on NZDs and generate evidence-based algorithms for improving surveillance and control with the ultimate aim of eliminating and eradicating these diseases. The platform will serve as a forum for African and international stakeholders, as well as existing One Health and NZD networks and harness and consolidate their efforts in the control and prevention of NZDs. The platform had its first meeting in Johannesburg, South Africa in March 2013.

One Health - ‘joining the dots’

Electronic Integrated Disease Surveillance System (EIDSS) has been used to strengthen and support monitoring and prevention of dangerous diseases within One Health concept by integrating veterinary and human surveillance, passive and active approaches, case-based records including disease-specific clinical data based on standardised case definitions and aggregated data, laboratory data including sample tracking linked to each case and event with test results and epidemiological investigations. Information was collected and shared in secure way by different means: through the distributed nodes which are continuously synchronised amongst each other, through the web service, through the handheld devices. Electronic Integrated Disease Surveillance System provided near real time information flow that has been then disseminated to the appropriate organisations in a timely manner. It has been used for comprehensive analysis and visualisation capabilities including real time mapping of case events as these unfold enhancing decision making. Electronic Integrated Disease Surveillance System facilitated countries to comply with the IHR 2005 requirements through a data transfer module reporting diseases electronically to the World Health Organisation (WHO) data center as well as establish authorised data exchange with other electronic system using Open Architecture approach. Pathogen Asset Control System (PACS) has been used for accounting, management and control of biological agent stocks. Information on samples and strains of any kind throughout their entire lifecycle has been tracked in a comprehensive and flexible solution PACS. Both systems have been used in a combination and individually. Electronic Integrated Disease Surveillance System and PACS are currently deployed in the Republics of Kazakhstan, Georgia and Azerbaijan as a part of the Cooperative Biological Engagement Program (CBEP) sponsored by the US Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA).

We first review historic and conceptual background to integrative thinking in medicine. Lacking a general theory of ‘One Health’, we provide an operational definition of ‘One Health’ and its leverage as: any added value in terms of human and animal health, financial savings or environmental benefit from closer cooperation of human and animal health sectors at all levels of organisation. Examples of such added value of ‘One Health’ are given from the fields of health systems, nutrition and zoonoses control in Africa and Asia. ‘One Health’ must become main-stream rather than a new discipline or new association; it should just become normal that practitioners and professionals in the health, animal and environment sectors work together as closely as possible. Current and future challenges in financing clean energy, migration flows, food security and global trade further warrant rethinking of human and animal health services. A conceptual outlook relates health as an outcome of human-environment systems called ‘health in social-ecological systems’. The paper ends with an outlook on the operationalisation of ‘One Health’ and its future potential, specifically also in industrialised countries.

No abstract available.

This article outlines a pathway to develop the business case for One Health. It describes the origin and development of One Health and then identifies five potential areas where One Health can add value and reduce costs. These are: (1) sharing health resources between the medical and veterinary sectors; (2) controlling zoonoses in animal reservoirs; (3) early detection and response to emerging diseases; (4) prevention of pandemics; and (5) generating insights and adding value to health research and development. Examples are given for each category along with preliminary estimates of the potential savings from adopting the One Health approach. The literature reviewed suggests that one dollar invested in One Health can generate five dollars worth of benefits and a global investment of US$25 billion over 10 years could generate benefits worth at least US$125 billion. Conservation implications: the time has come to make the bigger case for massive investment in One Health in order to transform the management of neglected and emerging zoonoses and to save the lives of millions of people and hundreds of millions of animals whose production supports and nourishes billions of impoverished people per annum.

One-health approaches have started being applied to health systems in some countries in controlling infectious diseases in order to reduce the burden of disease in humans, livestock and wild animals collaboratively. However, one wonders whether the problem of lingering and emerging zoonoses is more affected by health policies, low application of one-health approaches, or other factors. As part of efforts to answer this question, the Southern African Centre for Infectious Disease Surveillance (SACIDS) smart partnership of human health, animal health and socio-economic experts published, in April 2011, a conceptual framework to support One Health research for policy on emerging zoonoses. The main objective of this paper was to identify which factors really affect the burden of disease and how the burden could affect socio-economic well-being. Amongst other issues, the review of literature shows that the occurrence of infectious diseases in humans and animals is driven by many factors, the most important ones being the causative agents (viruses, bacteria, parasites, etc.) and the mediator conditions (social, cultural, economic or climatic) which facilitate the infection to occur and hold. Literature also shows that in many countries there is little collaboration between medical and veterinary services despite the shared underlying science and the increasing infectious disease threat. In view of these findings, a research to inform health policy must walk on two legs: a natural sciences leg and a social sciences one.