One Health Prevention
Zoonoses: A Public Health Challenge
70% of infectious diseases are zoonoses, due to pathogens transmitted from animals to humans, often through animal reservoirs (birds, mammals) or vectors (mosquitoes, ticks, etc.) that carry pathogens. According to IPBES[1], “their emergence is entirely driven by human activities. The underlying causes of pandemics are the same global environmental changes that drive biodiversity loss and climate change. […] These drivers of change bring wildlife, livestock, and people into closer contact, allowing animal microbes to move into people and lead to infections, sometimes outbreaks, and more rarely into pandemics”.
The COVID-19 pandemic highlighted the enormous impact of infectious diseases on our societies, with a colossal economic cost. The increase of vector-borne diseases, such as those transmitted by mosquitoes or ticks, also represents a significant threat for population, and animal health as well as a major economic burden for countries. A recent study by Roiz and coll. (2024) [2] estimated the economic impact of arboviruses, such as dengue, Zika, or chikungunya, transmitted by Aedes albopictus and Aedes aegypti mosquitoes, to exceed $95 billion over the past 40 years, and has increased by a 14-fold in relation with the increased incidence of these diseases. Interestingly, only a modest proportion of the cost (1/10) is invested in prevention.
Preventing to Better Prepare
Given these challenges, it is crucial to focus on preventing epidemics while remaining prepared for their possible emergence. Building on the successful outcomes of the MediLabSecure project, OneHealthSecure adopts a resolutely one-health approach to enable monitoring the circulation of arboviruses, viral diseases transmitted by mosquitoes and ticks. Therefore, the project's ‘objectives are to:
- Build capacity to enable the monitoring of wildlife hosts, vectors, and their diseases: integrate environmental factors to track wildlife species, including migratory birds, mammals and disease vectors, as well as the pathogens they may transmit to livestock and/or humans.
- Provide the scientists with capacities on how to encourage the local community engagement to participate in wildlife monitoring through participatory smartphone applications. This "citizen science
Provide tools to model epidemic risks: Integrate these data to create more precise epidemic risk maps, in order to better anticipate and respond to future health threats.
In this way, OneHealthSecure works toward a better understanding of epidemic dynamics, emphasizing collaboration between the environment, animals, and humans in line with the One Health approach.
[1] IPBES (2020) Workshop Report on Biodiversity and Pandemics of the Intergovernmental Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services. DOI:10.5281/zenodo.4147317
[2] The rising global economic costs of invasive Aedes mosquitoes and Aedes-borne diseases