Africa has the highest burden of infectious diseases in the world and yet the least capacity for its risk management. It has therefore become increasingly important to search for 'fit-for-purpose' approaches to infectious disease surveillance and thereby targeted disease control. The fact that the majority of human infectious diseases are originally of animal origin means we have to consider One Health (OH) approaches which require inter-sectoral collaboration for custom-made infectious disease surveillance in the endemic settings of Africa. A baseline survey was conducted to assess the current status and performance of human and animal health surveillance systems and subsequently a strategy towards OH surveillance system was developed. The strategy focused on assessing the combination of participatory epidemiological approaches and the deployment of mobile technologies to enhance the effectiveness of disease alerts and surveillance at the point of occurrence, which often lies in remote areas. We selected three study sites, namely the Ngorongoro, Kagera River basin and Zambezi River basin ecosystems. We have piloted and introduced the next-generation Android mobile phones running the EpiCollect application developed by Imperial College to aid geo-spatial and clinical data capture and transmission of this data from the field to the remote Information Technology (IT) servers at the research hubs for storage, analysis, feedback and reporting. We expect that the combination of participatory epidemiology and technology will significantly improve OH disease surveillance in southern Africa.

Using foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) as an example, this review describes new tools that can be used to detect and characterise livestock diseases. In recent years, molecular tests that can detect and characterise pathogens in a diverse range of sample types have revolutionised laboratory diagnostics. In addition to use in centralised laboratories, there are opportunities to locate diagnostic technologies close to the animals with suspected clinical signs. Work in this area has developed simple-to-use lateral-flow devices for the detection of FMD virus (FMDV), as well as new hardware platforms to allow molecular testing to be deployed into the field for use by non-specialists. Once FMDV has been detected, nucleotide sequencing is used to compare field strains with reference viruses. Transboundary movements of FMDV are routinely monitored using VP1 sequence data, while higher resolution transmission trees (at the farm-to-farm level) can be reconstructed using full-genome sequencing approaches. New technologies such as next-generation sequencing technologies are now being applied to dissect the viral sequence populations that exist within single samples. The driving force for the use of these technologies has largely been influenced by the priorities of developed countries with FMD-free (without vaccination) status. However, it is important to recognise that these approaches also show considerable promise for use in countries where FMD is endemic, although further modifications (such as sample archiving and strain and serotype characterisation) may be required to tailor these tests for use in these regions. Access to these new diagnostic and sequencing technologies in sub-Saharan Africa have the potential to provide novel insights into FMD epidemiology and will impact upon improved strategies for disease control. Effective control of infectious diseases is reliant upon accurate diagnosis of clinical cases using laboratory tests, together with an understanding of factors that impact upon the epidemiology of the infectious agent. A wide range of new diagnostic tools and nucleotide sequencing methods are used by international reference laboratories to detect and characterise the agents causing outbreaks of infectious diseases. In the past, high costs (initial capital expenses, as well as day-to-day maintenance and running costs) and complexity of the protocols used to perform some of these tests have limited the use of these methods in smaller laboratories. However, simpler and more cost-effective formats are now being developed that offer the prospect that these technologies will be even more widely deployed into laboratories particularly those in developing regions of the world such as sub-Saharan Africa.

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.

Rift Valley fever (RVF) in Zambia was first reported in 1974 during an epizootic of cattle and sheep that occurred in parts of Central, Southern and Copperbelt Provinces. In 1990, the disease was documented in nine districts of the provinces of Zambia. In the last two decades, there have been no reports of RVF. This long period without reported clinical disease raises questions as to whether RVF is a current or just a perceived threat. To address this question, World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) disease occurrence data on RVF for the period 2005-2010 in the Southern Africa Development Community (SADC) was analysed. From the analysis, it was evident that most countries that share a common border with Zambia had reported at least one occurrence of the disease during the period under review. Due to the absence of natural physical barriers between Zambia and most of her neighbours, informal livestock trade and movements is a ubiquitous reality. Analysis of the rainfall patterns also showed that Zambia received rains sufficient to support a mosquito population large enough for high risk of RVF transmission. The evidence of disease occurrence in nearby countries coupled with animal movement, and environmental risk suggests that RVF is a serious threat to Zambia. In conclusion, the current occurrence of RVF in Zambia is unclear, but there are sufficient indications that the magnitude of the circulating infection is such that capacity building in disease surveillance and courses on recognition of the disease for field staff is recommended. Given the zoonotic potential of RVF, these measures are also a prerequisite for accurate assessment of the disease burden in humans.

Bovine trypanosomosis displays various epidemiological aspects in various areas. In some instances the disease has a high prevalence in animals with high impact on production whereas in other cases the disease has a low impact on production despite a high level of infection in animals. In addition epidemiological changes are frequently observed in various areas and are related to many factors including the vectors, the host, the parasites, the environment as well as the livestock management. However the implication of these factors in these changes is not fully elucidated. In eastern Zambia, factors predicting the establishment of severe infection in cattle are all present. However trypanosomosis occurring in cattle in this area has a low impact on livestock production. Several studies on the characterisation of trypanosome strains circulating in domestic and wild animals have been conducted in order to clarify the epidemiology of this disease in this area. These studies aimed at evaluating genetic and biological characteristics of these strains including their virulence profiles, their transmissibility by tsetse flies, their resistance to drugs and interference between different strains. In this review these findings are analysed in order to elucidate the implication of trypanosome strain variability in the distribution and the expression of this disease in the study area. The evolutionary trends of the situation occurring in this study area are also explained. Use of these findings is the context of disease control in the study area is further discussed.