The journal The Lancet recently published a countdown on health and climate change. Attention was focused solely on humans. However, animals, including wildlife, livestock and pets, may also be impacted by climate change. Complementary to the high relevance of awareness rising for protecting humans against climate change, here we present a One Health approach, which aims at the simultaneous protection of humans, animals and the environment from climate change impacts (climate change adaptation). We postulate that integrated approaches save human and animal lives and reduce costs when compared to public and animal health sectors working separately. A One Health approach to climate change adaptation may significantly contribute to food security with emphasis on animal source foods, extensive livestock systems, particularly ruminant livestock, environmental sanitation, and steps towards regional and global integrated syndromic surveillance and response systems. The cost of outbreaks of emerging vector-borne zoonotic pathogens may be much lower if they are detected early in the vector or in livestock rather than later in humans. Therefore, integrated community-based surveillance of zoonoses is a promising avenue to reduce health effects of climate change.
Background: Increasing antimicrobial resistance (AMR) raises serious health and financial concerns. However, the main drivers of the emergence, spread and subsequent colonisation of resistant bacterial strains between humans, animals and the environment are still poorly understood.Objective: The aim of this review was to identify molecular studies on AMR in One Health settings in Africa and to determine the prevalence of antimicrobial resistance genes in humans, animals and the environment. Due to the very low number of studies including environmental samples, the meta-analysis only includes data obtained from animals and humans. Methods:The PubMed, Web of Science and Scopus databases were searched, identifying 10 464 publications on AMR in Africa from January 1st, 2000 until June 1st, 2020. Inclusion criteria were: (i) Integrated studies assessing AMR simultaneously in an animal-human, animal-environment, human-environment or animal-humanenvironment context, (ii) Genotypic characterisation of AMR and (iii) temporal and spatial relationship between samples from humans and animals. Statistical randomeffects model meta-analysis was performed. Results:Overall, 18 studies met our eligibility criteria and were included in this review.Six studies investigated Escherichia coli and Salmonella spp. (N = 6). The most prevalent AMR genes in animals included sul1 (36.2%), sul2 (32.0%), tetA (31.5%), strB (30.8%) and blaTEM (30.0%), whereas sul2 (42.4%), tetA (42.0%), strB (34.9%), blaTEM (28.8%) and sul1 (27.8%) were most prevalent in humans. We observed no clear pattern for a higher prevalence in either the animal or the human reservoir. Conclusion:To date, data on AMR in a One Health perspective in Africa are scarce.Prospective and longitudinal studies using an integrated One Health approach assessing the environment, animals and humans at the same time are needed to better understand the main drivers of AMR sharing in Africa.
Pastoralists and wildlife co‐exist in the Somali Regional State competing for habitat, food and water resources. A questionnaire survey conducted among 198 pastoralists, captured information on their perception of wildlife against the backdrop of wildlife population decrease, illegal wildlife trade and lack of quantitative and qualitative data in the area. The top perceived threats to livestock were drought (46%), wildlife attacks (33.8%) and diseases (20.2%). Daily encounters between wildlife and livestock were reported by 61.1% of respondents. Herbivores, including warthogs, accounted for the majority of these encounters (88.4%), whereas carnivores were rarely observed with livestock, except for jackals. The majority (92.9%) of the respondents did not think that wildlife could transmit diseases to livestock. Jackals were reported by 7.1% to transmit rabies. A strong dislike for wildlife was recorded in 99% of all respondents. All stated that wildlife should not be protected. Half of the respondents did not see any benefits in wildlife. Wildlife populations have decreased over the last 10 years, particularly lions and cheetahs. Pastoralist's attitudes and perceptions towards wildlife in the study area were negative, potentially affecting conservation efforts. There is an urgent need to improve awareness of the benefits of wildlife and to include wildlife in integrated human‐livestock‐environment surveillance systems.
Even though simple and effective treatments are available for diarrhea, it remains one of the leading causes of death in children under the age of five, accounting for 1.6 million deaths in 2017. Inadequate access to safe drinking water, particularly for pastoralists in Ethiopia, who are compelled to search for water during dry season. Thus, this study aimed to evaluate the quality of drinking water, sanitation, hygiene, and the prevalence of diarrhea among pastoralists’ children in Ethiopian. Methodology: Using a questionnaire, a cross-sectional study of 538 randomly selected households was done in 2018 to assess the prevalence of diarrhea in children younger than five years old and its association with water quality, sanitation, and hygiene. Portable DelAgua field kits were utilized to evaluate sources and home water for Escherichia coli contamination (E. coli). Logistic regression was used to assess the risk factors of water quality and diarrhea. Results: The prevalence of diarrhea was found to be 26.6% and 31.4% in the first and second weeks, respectively. There was an association between the prevalence of diarrhea in children and the consumption of low-quality water, improper storage conditions, caregivers who did not wash their hands prior to feeding a child, whenever their hands were filthy, and children aged 12 to 24 months. In terms of drinking water, households dependent on river water and unprotected dug wells had a considerably greater likelihood of faecal contamination than those dependent on protected water (Barkad). With regard to sanitation, almost all of the households surveyed lacked basic sanitation (95.9%) and hygiene. Conclusion: Water quality, hand-washing practice, water storage conditions, and the age of the children were found to be significantly associated with diarrhea. Thus, the current burden of diarrheal diseases in these children can be reduced by promoting widespread use of proven preventative measures, such as increasing awareness on handwashing, sanitation, waste disposal management and better treatment of stored water, and periodic monitoring of water quality.
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