One Health: Connecting Humans, Animals and the Environment by New Media Center University of Basel

John Cornforth

john230 — 2018-11-01 18:01:24 UTC

I have to say that I don't like Padlet as a means of communication. Apart from the unreliability, I find the wall of posts difficult to navigate. It is rarely obvious, and in most cases impossible to determine, who posted a comment. A quick survey of all Padlets before the previous version of this one disappeared showed that of 61 posts only 4 included a name in the text. 19 were identifiable if you expanded the post to reveal the login name.

4.3

Having got that off my chest I am trying to think what, as resident of Switzerland, I could present as being a candidate for a One Health study. Somewhat lamely I have decided on the problem of dog faeces in public spaces. From the emic point of view I find this highly irritating. In Switzerland dogs are not generally left to wander around by themselves but, from the number of signs of the sort you can see in the picture that I come across, I judge that I am not alone in my irritation and conclude that this is a social problem. From the practical point of view, councils in Switzerland do a very good job in providing waste bins which also dispense free plastic bags for dog-walkers to pick up their pet’s leavings. These bins are widespread and you can find them at the beginning of many hiking paths. One thing that amazes me is the number of these bags you can find discarded, with contents, next to walking paths. I don’t consider dog faeces to be a significant danger to my own health but from the etic (scientific) view I would expect dog faeces to be a potential source of pathogens and therefore a danger to young children who are likely to encounter the problem at face level.

4.14

If, say, I was a local counsellor wondering if my district needed to do something about the dog faeces problem, I would first need to educate myself about what pathogens in the faeces could be a danger to humans. I would then refer to the health authorities to get data on the prevalence of the associated diseases. My council is already doing a lot to mitigate the nuisance of dog faeces so if there is a real problem I would need to get the heath and veterinary people together to see if there are ways to eliminate the pathogens from the dogs or immunise people against the disease.

The challenges to serve and sustain Africa’s and South Africa's ecosystems of unparalleled richness by One Health approaches : Cindy Combrinck

2018-11-02 15:18:36 UTC

My question concerned the challenges to sustain South Africa's ecosystems and cultural richness.

1. People that I'd want to include would be local governments, in whichever province or sector of the country the study would be based.
Environmentalists to assess and provide damage control solutions and investigate further what natural resources are available to utilize and build on.
Teachers from both the local schools and communities, to assist with any language barriers, as well as educational authorities from the government sector who would aid the local teachers to provide a better understanding of what is going on in that they can in turn help to educate themselves and get the community involved.
Also students from the local and rural schools, to gain insight and perspective on how they feel with regard to their community, eco culture, animals(both domestic and wild) and their ideas and opinions on what they perceive to be issues and problems that need to be addressed and solved.
To elaborate further:
1. Who else to involve - Veterinarians. They would be a great addition in order to help with vaccinations, and investigating any disease in the area that may pose a problem to the ecosystem and the people who live there.
2. Who needs to be involved to implement policies - I'd appeal to the National Department of Health, the Department of Agriculture, clinicians(private & public), the National Health Laboratory and lastly I'd try to get an international agency to work with.
3. Who destroys the ecosystem - the largest component of degraded land are situated in the former homelands where dependence on natural resources, high population densities and unplanned extraction and management of natural resource(especially wood & unsustainable grazing and fire regimes) reduced livelihood options. These poor, and energy and food insecure communities have relied heavily on biomass for survival over many decades. This led to rural communities being caught up in a seemingly ever-worsening poverty-degradation.

Zoological Gardens: Disease Outbreaks Associated with Animals in Public Settings

2018-11-13 05:24:37 UTC

by Shilpa Modi Pandav

Visiting local Zoo is very popular with families with young children. Rarely, these visits get associated with disease outbreaks. Visitors can have direct animal contact and indirect contact through sawdust or shavings or simply touching the fences around the animal enclosures. While, the Zoo authorities are proactive in warning about physical dangers of directly coming into animal contact, rarely they highlight the safeguards against diseases related to animal contact. Well designed animal exhibits and activities are the key to prevent outbreaks.
Handwashing is the most important prevention. To improve hand hygiene compliance the Zoo staff can provide verbal reminders about hand hygiene to guests before they leave the animal area, use of larger signs with more prominent messages. It is important to have adequate and accessible handwashing facilities in the venue. Proper separation between animal exhibits and food preparation and consumption areas. Dedicated food service areas. Properly maintained drinking water systems and managed sewage or manure containment and disposal processes.

In India this involves engagement of the Ministry of Environment and Forests, the Ministry of Health and Family Welfare and community.
Elaborating further, this would involve adopting a transdisciplinary approach as community engagement is essential. This is because it involves changes in knowledge, attitude and practice. The stakeholders will be community and relevant Ministries and departments for formulating and implementing guidelines.

Source: Compendium of Measures to Prevent Disease Associated with Animals in Public Settings, 2017. The National Association of State Public Health Veterinarians Animal Contact Compendium Committee Russell F. Daly dvm, ms (Chair) Jennifer House dvm, mph Danielle Stanek dvm Mary Grace Stobierski dvm, mph https://www.cdc.gov/ accessed on 13^th November 2018

Antimicrobial resistance

elena_lucia_sassu — 2018-11-14 10:03:37 UTC

Elena Lucia Sassu

This is a worldwide problem concerning both high and low income countries. AMR came into my mind as daily life problem, since recently I witnessed several examples of antibiotic misuse and 2 friends of mine had serious problems with resistant pathogens.

Why do we have this problem? Malpractice, use of antibiotics in a prophylactic way rather than as target therapy, misuse of antibiotics (wrong dosage, early interruption of treatment and subsequent need of repeating the therapy)

Who is responsible for this? Veterinarians, doctors and drug smugglers (illegal trade of antibiotics mainly in low income countries).

Who should be involved to contain this phenomenon? Government: Ministry of Health and Ministry of Agriculture , where human and animal health are kept divided. Clinical practices (private and public). Pharmaceutical companies and drug distributors (in some countries the distribution is done directly by the vet). Veterinary practices, farmers and paravets. International organisations : FAO, OIE, WHO. Academic and research facilities to develop methods to better detect AMR or find an alternative solution to antibiotic treatments.

Strategies: creating guidelines and tracking system to better prevent misuse of antibiotics (legal consequences for doctors and veterinarians prescribing an antibiotic therapy without performing an antibiogram in case of non-emergency situation), implement system to track illegal trade of antibiotics, implement control on small animal practice (livestock is on the first line, but also antibiotic resistance in pets should not be underestimated considering the proximity to human beings), raise awareness: assessing the risk and communicating the problem to the public.

Food-borne animal diseases

drhellow — 2018-11-19 08:59:45 UTC

This photo was taken in a street in Lomé (beautiful capital of Togo). It is a butcher - retailer of small ruminant meat. The carcasses are exposed in a basin flush with the ground without any particular protection against contamination. Consumers are thus exposed to several risks of foodborne illness, especially if the meat is not properly cooked.
A study on the risks of foodborne contamination can be carried out first at a microbiological angle to determine the degree of contamination of exposed carcasses; in a second axis, the study can focus on the perception of the actors in the marketing chain on the quality of the product and finally, a third study can analyse the problem seen by consumers.

Ancestral wealth- Milena Peñuela

sanmilena17 — 2018-11-21 04:16:56 UTC

An interesting field in Colombia to work on the approach of a serious health with the ancestral communities (indigenous or agro-descendant), since we have a great cultural richness in these groups, and the approximations made only in the field of health have been reduced. general. The cultural wealth of these people would transfer a wealth and abundance of ancestral knowledge regarding notions and imaginaries in human, animal and environmental health, as well as aspects of prevention, treatment, diagnosis, sociocultural absrdaje, among others. It is also a challenge to inform and with arguments to explain why it is important to change certain sociocultural practices for the improvement of everyone's health.

Health Effects of Large-Scale Farming

flanaryae — 2020-04-21 17:38:07 UTC

Most meat and dairy products now produced in the U.S. come from large-scale farming operations with high-density populations of animals confined in single-species buildings. Mega-farming reduces costs and increases profits, but does so at significant downstream costs to environmental health and the daily lives of those living in neighboring communities. Waste products from mega-farming include contaminants like nitrogen and phosphorus, E. coli, growth hormones, antibiotics, copper sulfate, chemical additives used on manure and for equipment cleaning, and silage leachate from animal feed.

Cost/Benefit Effects of Implementing the National Animal Identification System (Amy Flanary, 4.3)

flanaryae — 2020-05-05 23:27:44 UTC

My background and interests lie in agriculture and how healthy environments and healthy food-production animals translate to human (consumer) health. Farm-to-table interactions occur daily across the U.S. Expanding on a comment I made previously (section 3.18), my question would be, "What are the cost/benefit effects of implementing the National Animal Identification System?" The associated study addresses opposition directed towards the NAIS program, and its overall lack of community support. Brief recap - the NAIS is a comprehensive animal tracking system aimed at tracing disease hazards and health risks in the U.S. food chain. Lack of program acceptance is related to known impacts and perceived impacts of NAIS regulations and expenses placed on agriculture communities. Farmers have viewed NAIS as a program being regulated and enforced from ‘the top down,’ and have questioned whether government decision-makers have an accurate understanding of their values, and financial, civil and religious rights. This lack of support has even sparked lawsuits against the USDA. My study involves retrospective examination of NAIS program development, implementation and enforcement, and applies the principles of the Ten Essential Public Health Services guidelines which include components of Natural Science, Social Science and Practical perspective.

https://www.cdc.gov/publichealthgateway/publichealthservices/essentialhealthservices.html

Our attitudes towards animal may change with time

2020-10-28 17:33:07 UTC

Normally, I will not want a cat near me, not even in my house but recently i went for a research in Germany and i have to leave with a cat. I later like the cat and i was fond of the cat, when i was going back to my country Nigeria, I was missing the cat the same way i was missing the family. I was surprised that this can happen to me. So i will like to conclude that our attitudes towards animal depend on the environment. Attached my photo with the companion cat