One Health, We Live When Earth Lives!


As of June 22nd, the number of confirmed cases of COVID-19 was reported to be more than 8.8 million with the death toll of 466,700 in the world. This novel virus is known to be originated from a wet market in Wuhan city in China last December and started to spread globally in March of 2020. The borders are closed and schools and industries get stopped. 

Experts warn that a pandemic like COVID-19 could now occur anytime and turn into an endemic, which is a disease regularly found in a certain area. Therefore, they insist that it is important to bring changes on general awareness and system based on “One Heath” approach. How is the disease related to ecosystem? And what does this approach actually mean?

 

What is One Health System?

CDC (Centers for Disease Control and Prevention) in the US explains One Health is an approach to recognize people’s health is closely connected to that of animals and the environment we share. It emphasizes that we should understand the interconnection among these three subjects and that the health of ecosystem should be controlled through comprehensive policy, law, research and practice.

The term, One Health, was originated from the word ’One Medicine’, the concept to combine the medicine for human and animals introduced by Calvin Schwabe, an epidemiologist, in 1984. William Karesh, then, used the term ‘One Health’ first in 2003 and finally the first international One Health Congress was held in Melbourne, Australia, in 2011.

While developing technology and expanding our habitats into new areas, humans caused serious environmental destruction and pollution. Consequently, it resulted in the climate change that affects both the number and distribution of wild animals(vectors) and the living condition of existing pathogen. The changes even contribute to the birth of new virus or germs.

The world’s growing population and densely populated cities, the development of dense breeding of livestock farming make it easy for infectious diseases to spread from animals to animals, and even from animals to humans. The increase in trade and travel between countries multiplies the odds for virus to become a world’s challenge.

According to Korean CDC, 75% of the emerging infectious diseases were zoonosis and 60% of the pathogens were originated in animals. In fact, SARS(Severe Acute respiratory Syndrome) in 2003, H1N1(Influenza A virus) in 2009, Ebola virus in 2014, MERS(Middle East Respiratory Syndrome) in 2015, and COVID-19 in 2019 are viral diseases that have been infected by animals such as bats or camels.

As zoonotic disease cases are on the rise, the needs of One Health approach for studies on humans, animals, and the environment have been increasing accordingly. The changes in eating habits such as frequent eating out and group meals tend to cause an epidemic outbreak of waterborne diseases and food poisoning. The measures for antimicrobial resistant bacteria are also needed. Experts point out that the exposure to various chemicals has weakened our immune system and this could be one of the major reasons for the increase of zoonosis. Therefore, One Health approach can be considered as an essential system for the Post-Corona era to secure the food safety and control the outbreak of zoonosis while preventing the expansion of antibiotic resistant bacteria simultaneously.

 

How is the World Applying One Health Approach?

Recognized that we are connected to each other, global societies started to introduce and apply One Health approach to various fields since the beginning of 2002. WHO(World Health Organization), FAO(Food and Agriculture Organization), OIE(Office International des Epizooties) and other international relevant organizations have been cooperating to control zoonosis. Some of major EU members have been dealing with the diseases with EDCD (European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control) playing a key role, and ARS(Agricultural Research Service) in the US has been focusing on research on animals’ health to develop technology and measures to prevent and control the zoonosis at an early stage.

In case of Korea, the Ministry of Health and Welfare (MOHW) announced in 2018 that they would take cooperative interdepartmental measures for managing the causes of health risks. The MOHW, Ministry of Oceans and Fisheries, Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs, Ministry of Environment, and Ministry of Food and Drug Safety carry collaborative R&D forward and operate TF for Zoonosis and epidemics. They also work with WHO and GHSA (Global Health Security Agenda) to spread One Health approach in international community. They work on the agreement that precautionary measures should be prepared through cooperation of each department as the One Health approach addresses.

 

The Post-Corona Era, Our Health Directly Linked to the Environment

To stop the spread of COVID-19, it is temporarily allowed to use single-use products and packaging to secure personal hygiene. Environmentally friendly policy has been halted tentatively in most of the countries.

Medical waste and the needs of rubbing alcohol and hand sanitizers have been soaring due to the novel virus and the massive amount of waste has been left behind. With rapid development of un-tact service, people prefer take-outs and delivery service to avoid any risks and it again leads to significant growth in use of disposable food packaging. Domestic facilities and warehouse for recyclable waste are already over the limit. The falling oil price and ban on waste import don’t give us many options to treat this waste. People in the relevant industries say that we could experience another Recyclable Waste Crisis, the one we had in 2018 after China ban the import of recyclable waste, soon.

We started to realize that we coexist with nature and how our health is connected to each other. That’s why it is necessary to perceive humans, animals, and the environment as in one integrated system, not separately. It requires our full understanding and willingness to make improvement since it is clear that the ways we cure disease and keep our hygiene can affect the environment. Being conscious of environmental crisis we are facing, wouldn’t NOW be the right time to focus on establishing environment-friendly policies and technology development with One Health approach? 

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