This post is guest written by our dedicated volunteers, Teja Sirec and Tomasz Benedyk.
One health is a global movement to coordinate our thinking and policy on human, animal, and environmental health.
Together with the recent emergence of zoonotic diseases (e.g. Ebola virus, avian influenza, West Nile virus, monkey pox), it cannot be stressed how important it is to understand the crosstalk between humans, animals and the surrounding environment.
Natural catastrophes and sanitary crises have led to the immediate establishment of international partnerships which, in turn, have given rise to increased meetings and close collaborative networks being formed between some of the biggest global development organizations, such as the United Nations, the World Organisation for Animal Health and the World Bank.
The innovative One Health approach was first introduced to the scientific community at an Expert Consultation in Canada in 2009. Since then it has grown to being an internationally recognized movement in the modern health sciences.
Major goals and principles of One Health
- Establishment of a decentralized network of collaborators among various disciplines
- Use of social campaigns and education to raise awareness and knowledge about the One Health culture
- Consolidation of both tools and knowledge on prevention, monitoring and treatment of infectious diseases (especially the emerging zoonoses and multidrug-resistant organisms)
- Improve human, environmental and animal health
- One Health influences economic and social aspects at the global, national and local level
Find out more
Discover more about the current initiatives in the One Health approach here
Find out more about some of the challenges in operationalizing the One Health approach here