In 2022, the largest ever virgin soil outbreak of Japanese encephalitis (JE) occurred in Australia resulting in 45 reported human cases of JE, with seven fatalities. Japanese encephalitis virus (JEV) was detected in 84 piggeries across Australia. In response, states implemented targeted vaccination programs for those individuals at the highest risk of JEV exposure. A mixed methods approach, including geospatial mapping of JEV vaccine distribution in Queensland, a case series of Queensland human cases and interviews with Queensland Health staff, assessed the JEV vaccination response program. Five notified human cases were reviewed, with three having occupational outdoor risk and local travel-related exposure. Vaccine coverage ranged from 0 to 7.4 doses per 100 people after 12 months of the program. The highest uptake was in southern Queensland, where 95% of the state’s commercial pig population is located. The vaccination program was limited by a heavy reliance on general practitioners, vast geographical distribution of eligible populations, difficulties mobilising and engaging eligible cohorts, and suboptimal One Health collaboration. Population and climate factors make it possible for the virus to become endemic. Targeted vaccination programs remain an important strategy to protect people at the highest risk of exposure, however, program improvements are required to optimize vaccine accessibility.

Reducing antimicrobial use (AMU) in livestock may be one of the keys to limit the emergence of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) in bacterial populations, including zoonotic pathogens. This study assessed the temporal association between AMU in livestock and AMR among Campylobacter isolates from human infections in the Netherlands between 2004 – 2020. Moreover, the associations between AMU and AMR in livestock and between AMR in livestock and AMR in human isolates were assessed. AMU and AMR data per antimicrobial class (tetracyclines, macrolides and fluoroquinolones) for Campylobacter jejuni and Campylobacter coli from poultry, cattle, and human patients were retrieved from national surveillance programs. Associations were assessed using logistic regression and the Spearman correlation test. Overall, there was an increasing trend in AMR among human C. jejuni/coli isolates during the study period, which contrasted with a decreasing trend in livestock AMU. In addition, stable trends in AMR in broilers were observed. No significant associations were observed between AMU and AMR in domestically produced broilers. Moderate to strong positive correlations were found between the yearly prevalence of AMR in broiler and human isolates. Reducing AMU in Dutch livestock alone may therefore not be sufficient to tackle the growing problem of AMR in Campylobacter among human cases in the Netherlands. More insight is needed regarding the population genetics and the evolutionary processes involved in resistance and fitness among Campylobacter.

The One Health High-Level Expert Panel’s definition of One Health includes optimizing the health of people, animals (wild and domestic) and ecosystems. For many One Health practitioners, wildlife that can spread zoonoses are the focus, particularly if they can come in contact with people. However, ecosystem health is often best-indicated by less-encountered species, for instance, amphibians and reptiles. This review highlights how these taxa can benefit human health and well-being, including cultural significance, as well as their impact on plant, animal and environmental health. We highlight current challenges to the health of these species and the need to include them in the One Health Joint Action Plan. We conclude with a call to action for inclusion of amphibians and reptiles in a One Health approach.

Knowledge about One Health approach and its importance among the practitioners and the community in addressing health threats is of paramount important. This study aimed to assess knowledge of One Health actors on multi-sectoral coordination in addressing health risks in selected regions of Tanzania. A descriptive study was conducted from June to August 2023 in selected regions of Arusha, Iringa and Dodoma where quantitative and qualitative data were collected from 101 participants representing the line ministries and sub-national regional and district levels. Descriptive analysis was done using EPI INFO 7.2.5.0 statistical software and Microsoft excel. Results showed a decreasing proportion of participants reporting to be aware of One Health approach at the National level with 100.0% awareness and only 32.3% awareness at the district level. It was also revealed that 76.9% of the participants at the national level had received One Health training through short courses, workshops meetings, and Continuous Professional Development (CPD) courses compared to the varying proportions of 57.7% and 19.4% at the regional and district level, respectively. Limited awareness of different professional disciplines on One Health approach is the major challenge in its operationalisation and institutionalisation at sub-national levels. Awareness creation to One Health actors and advocacy to policy and decision-makers at all levels will enhance implementation, multi-sectoral coordination and collaboration among key actors in addressing health risks emergencies.

In 2020, the Kuujjuaq Dog Project (KDP) was operationalized in the Northern Village of Kuujjuaq (Québec, Canada) to mitigate issues at the human–dog interface. Differing from previous interventions in its EcoHealth approach, it provided veterinary services, educational components (school workshops and Facebook posts) and strengthened local dog control measures. In 2022, an implementation evaluation assessed its quality of its delivery, differentiation, adaptations and the community’s responsiveness. The study followed key principles of the One Health approach and a mixed-methods design, combining a survey of 74 participants and individual interviews with 10 key stakeholders and 25 other community members. Analysis confirmed the relevance of the KDP, highlighting its innovative nature compared to previous dog-related interventions in northern Québec. Awareness of and exposure to the KDP’s components varied considerably between veterinary services (89%), Facebook posts (55%) and school workshops (27%). Global exposure to both the veterinary services and educational components was lower among Inuit, men and non-dog owners (not statistically significant). Barriers and facilitators to implementation included long-term engagement of stakeholders and building meaningful partnerships with local stakeholders. Beside supporting the future evolution of the KDP, this study fills knowledge gaps on how to successfully implement integrated, participatory interventions in northern Indigenous communities.

We aimed to estimate the overall apparent prevalence, true prevalence, and the spatial, temporal, and test-specific burden of bovine tuberculosis in Bangladesh. PubMed, Web of Science, Scopus, Google Scholar, and BanglaJOL were searched for bovine tuberculosis publications in Bangladesh from 1 January 1970 to 23 June 2023. Of 142 articles screened, systematic review and meta-analysis were performed on 22 (15.5%) articles. The apparent estimated bovine tuberculosis prevalence was 7%. The apparent Bayesian pooled mean bovine tuberculosis prevalences based on caudal fold test and single intradermal comparative tuberculin test were 7.83% and 9.89%, respectively, and the true pooled mean prevalences were 10.39% and 10.48%, respectively. Targeted interventions are recommended for districts with higher prevalence to effectively reduce the bovine tuberculosis burden in those areas. Current diagnostic practices employed in Bangladesh may not accurately reflect the bovine tuberculosis burden. Our findings highlight the need for better diagnostic tools and supplemental testing methods to ensure accurate diagnosis and surveillance. Efforts should prioritize obtaining ‘true’ prevalence estimates corrected for misclassification bias, rather than relying solely on apparent prevalence. Underestimating the bovine tuberculosis burden could result in inadequate resource allocation and hinder the implementation of effective control measures.

Multidisciplinary One Health (OH) collaboration coupled with information communication and technology provides an avenue for combating and avoiding emerging and reemerging diseases. In 2020, AFROHUN-Kenya organized a OH App development hackathon to build an application for frontline community health workers to respond to OH challenges. This article describes the purpose, process, benefits and challenges of this hackathon. Forty-nine participants, divided into eight groups took part in the hackathon. The teams ranged from four to eight members, with 55% female. A total of eight applications were developed during the hackathon all of which are in the process of patenting, before deployment as open-source applications. In the post-hackathon survey, 95% of participants indicated that they had a better grasp of the topic because of the team members’ diverse perspectives and that working in multidisciplinary teams had resulted in new friendships and partnerships. In total, 72% of respondents indicated they would be interested in participating in another hackathon. However, 65% of the respondents suggested that the training time be lengthened. This study demonstrates that multidisciplinary hackathons effectively enhance learning, significantly impact communities and improve students’ soft skills, including project and time management, interpersonal communication, motivational strategies and problem-solving.

The need for a planetary approach to healthcare is widely recognised at national and international levels. Social prescribing is becoming an increasingly popular strategy for meeting contemporary social, physical and mental health needs as well as tackling health inequalities. As this is a relatively new and emerging healthcare intervention, a comprehensive and accurate understanding of its impact is essential to support continued improvements in care, develop strategies for scale-up and delivery and justify further funding and investment. Nature-based Social Prescribing (NBSP) has unique potential to affect animal and environmental outcomes as well as human health. The One Health perspective can be used to operationalise and evaluate NBSP. This article presents the Nature-based Social Prescribing Impact Pathways (NaBSPIP) framework, which can be used to guide NBSP design and evaluation to leverage maximum benefit for humans, animals and the environment that we share.

Ross River virus (RRV), the most medically and economically important arbovirus in Australia, has been the most prevalent arbovirus infections in humans for many years. Infected humans and horses often suffer similar clinical symptoms. We conducted a prospective longitudinal study over a 3.5-year period to investigate the exposure dynamics of RRV in three foal cohorts (n = 32) born in a subtropical region of South East Queensland, Australia, between 2020 and 2022. RRV-specific seroconversion was detected in 56% (n = 18) of foals with a median time to seroconversion, after waning of maternal antibodies, of 429 days (95% CI: 294–582). The median age at seroconversion was 69 weeks (95% CI: 53–57). Seroconversion events were only detected between December and March (Southern Hemisphere summer) over the entire study period. Cox proportion hazards regression analyses revealed that seroconversions were significantly (p < 0.05) associated with air temperature in the month of seroconversion. Time-lags in meteorological variables were not significantly (p > 0.05) associated with seroconversion, except for relative humidity (p = 0.036 at 2-month time-lag). This is in contrast to research results of RRV infection in humans, which peaked between March and May (Autumn) and with a 0–3 month time-lag for various meteorological risk factors. Therefore, horses may be suitable sentinels for monitoring active arbovirus circulation and could be used for early arbovirus outbreak detection in human populations.

Trauma is a common cause of morbidity and mortality in humans and companion animals. Recent efforts in procedural development, training, quality systems, data collection, and research have positively impacted patient outcomes; however, significant unmet need still exists. Coordinated efforts by collaborative, translational, multidisciplinary teams to advance trauma care and improve outcomes have the potential to benefit both human and veterinary patient populations. Strategic use of veterinary clinical trials informed by expertise along the research spectrum (i.e., benchtop discovery, applied science and engineering, large laboratory animal models, clinical veterinary studies, and human randomized trials) can lead to increased therapeutic options for animals while accelerating and enhancing translation by providing early data to reduce the cost and the risk of failed human clinical trials. Active topics of collaboration across the translational continuum include advancements in resuscitation (including austere environments), acute traumatic coagulopathy, trauma-induced coagulopathy, traumatic brain injury, systems biology, and trauma immunology. Mechanisms to improve funding and support innovative team science approaches to current problems in trauma care can accelerate needed, sustainable, and impactful progress in the field. This review article summarizes our current understanding of veterinary and human trauma, thereby identifying knowledge gaps and opportunities for collaborative, translational research to improve multispecies outcomes. This translational trauma group of MDs, PhDs, and DVMs posit that a common understanding of injury patterns and resulting cellular dysregulation in humans and companion animals has the potential to accelerate translation of research findings into clinical solutions.

We used a narrative literature review to identify attributes of One Health practitioners who can close the gap between intention and action to protect and promote health in this era of polycrises. The intention in this essay was to instigate discourse that challenges the current state of One Health teaching and practice, thus helping us reflect on how to future-ready One Health. One Health researchers and practitioners must become agents of change who accelerate and amplify innovations that promote One Health as a settings-based approach to advance interspecies and intergenerational health equity. This essay outlines how future readiness and disruption are intertwined and proposes that One Health training needs to cultivate curiosity, agility and convergence thinking to create future-ready researchers and practitioners. Institutional systems that can support future-ready One Health agents of change will need to be attentive to mechanisms that close the knowing-to-doing gap and promote crossing barriers. Game changing One Health requires greater investment in cross-cutting capacities and ideas that will make it easier to see what is working and for whom. At the heart of this issue is the need to mainstream concepts of fairness and redistribution of the health resources between people, animals, and settings.

Climate change significantly impacts our planet’s health, ecosystems, plants, animals and humans, increasing extreme weather events and the incidence and prevalence of infectious diseases, including zoonotic diseases. We reviewed the environmental changes affecting human, animal and planetary health and conducted a bibliometric analysis from 2012 to 22 that included these components. We identified 448 publications published on the topic throughout that period. Then, we reflected on the Research Directions question: How can we improve and facilitate multi-sectoral collaboration in warning and response systems for infectious diseases and natural hazards to account for their drivers, interdependencies and cascading impacts? The bibliometric analysis of planetary health has shown increasing interest among researchers since 2017, peaking in 2022. Lancet Planetary Health was the journal with more published articles; The London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine was the best-placed institution, and The United States led in topic-related publications. On the other hand, the climatic and pandemic global environmental crises demand fostered surveillance, which should concentrate on the drivers of disease, giving signals that account for human and animal health and environmental degradation. In response to global crises, higher education curricula should integrate One Health and Planetary Health approaches to achieve transdisciplinary thinking, allowing transcend knowledge, research and observation into action.

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a growing One Health crisis that can be impacted by other challenges of sustainable development, such as climate change, but few interventions have been assessed with a systems-wide lens. The objectives of this study were to use a previously defined fuzzy cognitive map (FCM) of the Swedish One Health system to: 1) identify areas in the system to target interventions; and 2) test the potential ability and viability of interventions to reduce AMR under a changing climate. The FCM, based on participatory modelling workshops and literature scan, was used to assess the sustainability of eight interventions under potential climate change conditions. Network metrics were calculated to describe the system structure and identify highly impactful nodes. The network metrics identified high-leverage nodes including alternative productions systems and good farming practices. None of the scenarios evaluated were able to adequately reduce AMR within the system. Overall, fuzzy cognitive mapping provides an innovative way to analyse the AMR system, identify high-leverage interventions, and examine potential impact of interventions using a broader systems lens.

The question posed is how deep-time perspectives contribute to tackling contemporary One Health challenges, improving understanding and disease mitigation. Using evidence from the field of paleopathology, it is possible to explore this question and highlight key learning points from the past to focus the minds of those making healthcare policy decisions today. In previous centuries urbanization led to poorer health for a wide range of indicators, including life expectancy, sanitation and intestinal parasites, airway disorders such as maxillary sinusitis, metabolic diseases such as rickets, and even conditions resulting from clothing fashions such as bunions. Modern concerns regarding the quality of urban air and rivers show we have still to incorporate these lessons. When we consider major infectious diseases affecting past societies such as bubonic plague, tuberculosis and leprosy, interaction between humans and wild mammal reservoirs was key. Wild red squirrels in Britain today remain infected by the medieval strain of leprosy that affected people 1,500 years ago. It is clear that the One Health focus on the interaction between humans, animals and their environment is important. Eradicating zoonotic infectious diseases from humans but not these reservoirs leaves the door open to their spread back to people in the future.

Antimicrobial resistance (AMR) is a pressing global health issue with serious implications for health, food security, and livelihoods. Collective action, from local to global, that draws on the One Health (OH) approach to facilitate collaboration between the human, animal, and environmental sectors is required to inform initiatives to mitigate AMR. For AMR surveillance, this involves applying an intersectoral, multistakeholder perspective to guide the co-creation of knowledge and policy around the collection, analysis, and application of surveillance data to detect, monitor, and prevent AMR health threats. Currently, there is little available evidence on how to operationalize a OH approach to support integrated AMR surveillance systems, or on how the governance of such systems facilitates intersectoral action on AMR. We conducted a scoping review of the literature to identify the governance domains most relevant to applying the OH approach to the design and evaluation of AMR surveillance systems. We found that governance is a crucial component of the development of surveillance systems equipped to tackle complex, structural issues such as AMR. The governance domains identified include participation, coordination and collaboration, management, sustainability, accountability and transparency, and equity. These domains are relevant throughout all stages of policy design, implementation, and evaluation of AMR surveillance systems. Equity is both a domain and an essential component of the other domains. All the domains are interdependent and co-constitutive, so that progress in one domain can accelerate progress in another. The conceptual framework presented in this article can inform the design and evaluation of OH AMR governance systems and other complex health challenges that have similar barriers and facilitators to OH governance. The qualitative evaluation questions developed for each domain facilitate assessment of the breadth (the range of actors involved in governance) and depth (how meaningful their engagement is) for each domain relevant to OH governance. Finally, the prioritization of formal, sustainable, and democratic governance of AMR can help to facilitate achievement of the sustainable development goals (SDGs) and promote conservation of the use of antimicrobials for future generations.

Non-aureus staphylococci (NAS) are gaining importance in mastitis and public health, and some NAS have been reclassified as mammaliicocci (NASM). Bovine milk production has a major influence on the world economy, being an essential source of income for small, medium and large producers, and bovine mastitis caused by NASM can cause an economic impact. Mastitis generates financial losses due to reduced revenue, increased veterinary costs and expenses associated with animal slaughter. However, it is also a public health issue involving animal health and welfare, human health and the ecosystem. Furthermore, it is an increasingly common infection caused by NASM, including antimicrobial-resistant strains. Despite all these adverse effects that NASM can cause, some studies also point to its protective role against mastitis. Therefore, this review article addresses the negative and positive aspects that NASM can cause in bovine mastitis, the virulence of the disease and resistance factors that make it difficult to treat and, through the One Health approach, presents a holistic view of how mastitis caused by NASM can affect both animal and human health at one and the same time.

This research communication paper addresses the hypothesis that the use of therapeutic alternatives for mastitis, such as intramammary ozone, can cure the disease with lower costs and without harmful residues for human consumption and without formation of microbial resistance like the ones caused by indiscriminate use of antibiotics in dairy farms. The study was performed in 36 mammary quarters from 12 dairy cows with subclinical mastitis grade three. The experimental units were randomly assigned into four groups and each group received a treatment. Treatments comprised (a) 20 μg/ml ozone gas; (b) 40 μg/ml ozone gas; (c) negative control treatment of 12.5 μg/ml ozonated saline and (d) positive control treatment of 100 mg of cephalexin + 100 mg of neomycin + 10 mg of prednisolone, all by intramammary injection. In all quarters, milk was collected before and after the application of treatments for California mastitis test and evaluation of milk composition, somatic cell count, and bacterial cultures. The results indicated that the use of intramammary ozone did have a therapeutic effect, and whilst this was less than that of antibiotics, ozone does confer some advantages. Treated milk had a good composition, the treatment cost was low, milk withdrawal may not be necessary and there is no risk of antibiotic resistance.

Piroplasms, which include the agents of cattle fever and human and dog babesiosis, are a diverse group of blood parasites of significant veterinary and medical importance. The invasive Asian longhorned tick, Haemaphysalis longicornis, is a known vector of piroplasms in its native range in East Asia and invasive range in Australasia. In the USA, H. longicornis has been associated with Theileria orientalis Ikeda outbreaks that caused cattle mortality. To survey invasive populations of H. longicornis for a broad range of piroplasms, 667 questing H. longicornis collected in 2021 from 3 sites in New Jersey, USA, were tested with generalist piroplasm primers targeting the 18S small subunit rRNA (395–515 bp, depending on species) and the cytochrome b oxidase loci (1009 bp). Sequences matching Theileria cervi type F (1 adult, 5 nymphs), an unidentified Theileria species (in 1 nymph), an undescribed Babesia sensu stricto (‘true’ Babesia, 2 adults, 2 nymphs), a Babesia sp. Coco (also a ‘true Babesia’, 1 adult, 1 nymph), as well as Babesia microti S837 (1 adult, 4 nymphs) were recovered. Babesia microti S837 is closely related to the human pathogen B. microti US-type. Additionally, a 132 bp sequence matching the cytochrome b locus of deer, Odocoileus virginanus, was obtained from 2 partially engorged H. longicornis. The diverse assemblage of piroplasms now associated with H. longicornis in the USA spans 3 clades in the piroplasm phylogeny and raises concerns of transmission amplification of veterinary pathogens as well as spillover of pathogens from wildlife to humans.