scholarly journals Zoonoses, One Health and complexity: wicked problems and constructive conflict

2017 ◽  
Vol 372 (1725) ◽  
pp. 20160171 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Waltner-Toews
Keyword(s):  
One Health ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Wicked Problems ◽  
Ecological Systems ◽  
Value Systems ◽  
Complex Interactions ◽  
Constructive Conflict ◽  
Changing World

Infectious zoonoses emerge from complex interactions among social and ecological systems. Understanding this complexity requires the accommodation of multiple, often conflicting, perspectives and narratives, rooted in different value systems and temporal–spatial scales. Therefore, to be adaptive, successful and sustainable, One Health approaches necessarily entail conflicts among observers, practitioners and scholars. Nevertheless, these integrative approaches have, both implicitly and explicitly, tended to marginalize some perspectives and prioritize others, resulting in a kind of technocratic tyranny. An important function of One Health approaches should be to facilitate and manage those conflicts, rather than to impose solutions. This article is part of the themed issue ‘One Health for a changing world: zoonoses, ecosystems and human well-being’.

scholarly journals Integrative concepts and practices of health in transdisciplinary social ecology

2019 ◽  
Vol 2 (1) ◽  
pp. 71-90 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timo Assmuth ◽  
Xianwen Chen ◽  
Christopher Degeling ◽  
Tari Haahtela ◽  
Katherine N. Irvine ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Communities Of Practice ◽  
One Health ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Ecological Systems ◽  
Knowledge Generation ◽  
Systematic Evaluation ◽  
Scientific Publications ◽  
Integrative Health ◽  
Literature Reviews ◽  
Health Concepts

AbstractIncreasing recognition of interdependencies of the health of humans, other organisms and ecosystems, and of their importance to socio-ecological systems, necessitates application of integrative concepts such as One Health and EcoHealth. These concepts open new perspectives for research and practice but also generate confusion and divergent opinion, prompting new theories, and call for empirical clarification and evaluation. Through a semi-systematic evaluation of knowledge generation in scientific publications (comprised of literature reviews, conceptual models and analyses of communities of practice), we show how integrative concepts and approaches to health evolve and are adopted. Our findings indicate that while their contexts, goals and rationales vary, integrative concepts of health essentially arise from shared interests in living systems. Despite recent increased attention to ecological and societal aspects of health including broader sustainability issues, the focus remains anthropocentric and oriented towards biomedicine. Practices reflect and in turn transform these concepts, which together with practices also influence ways of integration. Overarching narratives vary between optimism and pessimism towards integrated health and knowledge. We conclude that there is an urgent need for better, coherent and more deeply integrative health concepts, approaches and practices to foster the well-being of humans, other animals and ecosystems. Consideration of these concepts and practices has methodological and political importance, as it will transform thinking and action on both society and nature and specifically can enrich science and practice, expanding their scope and linking them better. Transdisciplinary efforts are crucial to developing such concepts and practices to properly address the multiple facets of health and to achieve their appropriate integration for the socio-ecological systems at stake. We propose the term “transdisciplinary health” to denote the new approaches needed.

scholarly journals Local disease–ecosystem–livelihood dynamics: reflections from comparative case studies in Africa

2017 ◽  
Vol 372 (1725) ◽  
pp. 20160163 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melissa Leach ◽  
Bernard Bett ◽  
M. Said ◽  
Salome Bukachi ◽  
Rosemary Sang ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Case Studies ◽  
One Health ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Patch Dynamics ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Valley Fever ◽  
Humid Forest ◽  
Trade Offs ◽  
Ecosystem Interactions

This article explores the implications for human health of local interactions between disease, ecosystems and livelihoods. Five interdisciplinary case studies addressed zoonotic diseases in African settings: Rift Valley fever (RVF) in Kenya, human African trypanosomiasis in Zambia and Zimbabwe, Lassa fever in Sierra Leone and henipaviruses in Ghana. Each explored how ecological changes and human–ecosystem interactions affect pathogen dynamics and hence the likelihood of zoonotic spillover and transmission, and how socially differentiated peoples’ interactions with ecosystems and animals affect their exposure to disease. Cross-case analysis highlights how these dynamics vary by ecosystem type, across a range from humid forest to semi-arid savannah; the significance of interacting temporal and spatial scales; and the importance of mosaic and patch dynamics. Ecosystem interactions and services central to different people's livelihoods and well-being include pastoralism and agro-pastoralism, commercial and subsistence crop farming, hunting, collecting food, fuelwood and medicines, and cultural practices. There are synergies, but also tensions and trade-offs, between ecosystem changes that benefit livelihoods and affect disease. Understanding these can inform ‘One Health’ approaches towards managing ecosystems in ways that reduce disease risks and burdens. This article is part of the themed issue ‘One Health for a changing world: zoonoses, ecosystems and human well-being’.

Land use, water and Mediterranean landscapes: modelling long-term dynamics of complex socio-ecological systems

2010 ◽  
Vol 368 (1931) ◽  
pp. 5275-5297 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Michael Barton ◽  
Isaac I. Ullah ◽  
Sean Bergin
Keyword(s):  
Land Use ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Computational Modelling ◽  
Ecological Systems ◽  
Land Use Land Cover ◽  
Human Land Use ◽  
Complex Interactions ◽  
Mediterranean Landscapes ◽  
Temporal And Spatial

The evolution of Mediterranean landscapes during the Holocene has been increasingly governed by the complex interactions of water and human land use. Different land-use practices change the amount of water flowing across the surface and infiltrating the soil, and change water’s ability to move surface sediments. Conversely, water amplifies the impacts of human land use and extends the ecological footprint of human activities far beyond the borders of towns and fields. Advances in computational modelling offer new tools to study the complex feedbacks between land use, land cover, topography and surface water. The Mediterranean Landscape Dynamics project (MedLand) is building a modelling laboratory where experiments can be carried out on the long-term impacts of agropastoral land use, and whose results can be tested against the archaeological record. These computational experiments are providing new insights into the socio-ecological consequences of human decisions at varying temporal and spatial scales.

scholarly journals Complex community responses underpin biodiversity change following invasion

2021 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alessandra R. Kortz ◽  
Anne E. Magurran
Keyword(s):  
Invasive Species ◽  
Species Richness ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Species Abundance ◽  
Ecological Systems ◽  
Multi Scale ◽  
Mechanistic Approach ◽  
Α Diversity ◽  
Biodiversity Change ◽  
Insight Into

AbstractHow do invasive species change native biodiversity? One reason why this long-standing question remains challenging to answer could be because the main focus of the invasion literature has been on shifts in species richness (a measure of α-diversity). As the underlying components of community structure—intraspecific aggregation, interspecific density and the species abundance distribution (SAD)—are potentially impacted in different ways during invasion, trends in species richness provide only limited insight into the mechanisms leading to biodiversity change. In addition, these impacts can be manifested in distinct ways at different spatial scales. Here we take advantage of the new Measurement of Biodiversity (MoB) framework to reanalyse data collected in an invasion front in the Brazilian Cerrado biodiversity hotspot. We show that, by using the MoB multi-scale approach, we are able to link reductions in species richness in invaded sites to restructuring in the SAD. This restructuring takes the form of lower evenness in sites invaded by pines relative to sites without pines. Shifts in aggregation also occur. There is a clear signature of spatial scale in biodiversity change linked to the presence of an invasive species. These results demonstrate how the MoB approach can play an important role in helping invasion ecologists, field biologists and conservation managers move towards a more mechanistic approach to detecting and interpreting changes in ecological systems following invasion.

Protected Areas: offering security to whom, when and where?

2016 ◽  
Vol 43 (2) ◽  
pp. 172-180 ◽  
Author(s):  
ALICE B. KELLY ◽  
A. CLARE GUPTA
Keyword(s):  
Protected Areas ◽  
Environmental Conditions ◽  
Protected Area ◽  
Spatial Scales ◽  
Local Population ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Economic Context ◽  
Term Management ◽  
Over Time

SUMMARYThis study considers the issue of security in the context of protected areas in Cameroon and Botswana. Though the literature on issues of security and well-being in relation to protected areas is extensive, there has been less discussion of how and in what ways these impacts and relationships can change over time, vary with space and differ across spatial scales. Looking at two very different historical trajectories, this study considers the heterogeneity of the security landscapes created by Waza and Chobe protected areas over time and space. This study finds that conservation measures that various subsets of the local population once considered to be ‘bad’ (e.g. violent, exclusionary protected area creation) may be construed as ‘good’ at different historical moments and geographical areas. Similarly, complacency or resignation to the presence of a park can be reversed by changing environmental conditions. Changes in the ways security (material and otherwise) has fluctuated within these two protected areas has implications for the long-term management and funding strategies of newly created and already existing protected areas today. This study suggests that parks must be adaptively managed not only for changing ecological conditions, but also for shifts in a protected area's social, political and economic context.

China's great transformation: from duty to personal rejuvenation and well-being

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 (1) ◽  
pp. 84-101
Author(s):  
William Jankowiak
Keyword(s):  
Common Good ◽  
Northern China ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Value Systems ◽  
Chinese History ◽  
Individual Choice ◽  
Cultural Model ◽  
Chinese Values ◽  
Provincial Capital ◽  
Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region

If the freedom to choose is important for personal well-being, what happens when there are drastic restrictions on personal choice? China represents an opportune case to explore this question. Its fifty-plus years of experimenting with a redistributive command economy, combined with periodic bursts of political fever, made extreme egalitarianism more important than other Chinese values recognising individual merit, vision, and achievement. Throughout much of Chinese history, these values were widely shared; but in the current era, an alternative cultural model was stressed: social responsibility for the community and nation. Individuals were ideally expected to de-emphasise their individuality in favour of "the common good". In China, the juxtaposition of the two competing value systems—extreme egalitarianism versus individual choice, responsibility, and personal achievement—engendered confusion, anger, angst, and unhappiness. In China, from 1949 to 1976, this accounts, in part, for much of the suffering people experienced in living their lives. In this article I examine the Chinese cultural model for life satisfaction or wellbeing in two different eras: work unit (danwei), socialism (1981–1983), and market reform (1987–2000). My sample was found in Hohhot, the provincial capital of the Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region in northern China, where I lived from 1981 to 1983; six months in 1987; five months in 2000 (a total of 35 months). I will also examine the ways Chinese sought well-being in four different domains: friendship, family, occupation, and fun activities. By analysing how Chinese conceptualised their lives over time, I will identify the conceptual frameworks individuals used to assess their relative well-being.

scholarly journals A socio-economic approach to One Health policy research in southern Africa

2012 ◽  
Vol 79 (2) ◽  
Author(s):  
Kim A. Kayunze ◽  
Angwara D. Kiwara ◽  
Eligius Lyamuya ◽  
Dominic M. Kambarage ◽  
Jonathan Rushton ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Infectious Disease ◽  
Health Policy ◽  
Infectious Diseases ◽  
Burden Of Disease ◽  
One Health ◽  
Animal Health ◽  
Policy Research ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Cultural Economic ◽  
Emerging Zoonoses

One-health approaches have started being applied to health systems in some countries in controlling infectious diseases in order to reduce the burden of disease in humans, livestock and wild animals collaboratively. However, one wonders whether the problem of lingering and emerging zoonoses is more affected by health policies, low application of one-health approaches, or other factors. As part of efforts to answer this question, the Southern African Centre for Infectious Disease Surveillance (SACIDS) smart partnership of human health, animal health and socio-economic experts published, in April 2011, a conceptual framework to support One Health research for policy on emerging zoonoses. The main objective of this paper was to identify which factors really affect the burden of disease and how the burden could affect socio-economic well-being. Amongst other issues, the review of literature shows that the occurrence of infectious diseases in humans and animals is driven by many factors, the most important ones being the causative agents (viruses, bacteria, parasites, etc.) and the mediator conditions (social, cultural, economic or climatic) which facilitate the infection to occur and hold. Literature also shows that in many countries there is little collaboration between medical and veterinary services despite the shared underlying science and the increasing infectious disease threat. In view of these findings, a research to inform health policy must walk on two legs: a natural sciences leg and a social sciences one.

scholarly journals Thalime: A mobile app designed just for patients and their families

2018 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hatley Forrest McMicking
Keyword(s):  
One Health ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Mobile App ◽  
Blood Transfusions ◽  
Health Resource ◽  
Management Tools ◽  
Virtual Coaching ◽  
Health Tracking ◽  
Peer Community ◽  
Visual Health

Introducing the first mobile app designed specifically for the Thalassemia community; Thalime, your personalized private community. Thalime is a free app that connects patients and caregivers of Thalassemia to others who know what you’re going through. Learn about your condition from a trusted source. Improve your well-being with health-tracking tools. Get support from others just like you. With personalized disease management tools designed to make life easier every day, Thalime is your all-in-one health resource that empowers you to be in control of your health. Build your private peer community to learn, share and receive support. Follow programs and set goals with our personalized recommendations and virtual coaching. Track your progress with our visual health tracker for blood transfusions and medication tracker. Additional health tracker tools allow you to monitor and share your mood, energy, pain and more.

scholarly journals One Health, Fermented Foods, and Gut Microbiota

Foods ◽  
2018 ◽  
Vol 7 (12) ◽  
pp. 195 ◽  
Author(s):  
Victoria Bell ◽  
Jorge Ferrão ◽  
Lígia Pimentel ◽  
Manuela Pintado ◽  
Tito Fernandes
Keyword(s):  
Lactic Acid ◽  
Gut Microbiota ◽  
One Health ◽  
Inflammatory Diseases ◽  
Animal Health ◽  
Saturated Fat ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Fermented Foods ◽  
Being There ◽  
The Impact

Changes in present-day society such as diets with more sugar, salt, and saturated fat, bad habits and unhealthy lifestyles contribute to the likelihood of the involvement of the microbiota in inflammatory diseases, which contribute to global epidemics of obesity, depression, and mental health concerns. The microbiota is presently one of the hottest areas of scientific and medical research, and exerts a marked influence on the host during homeostasis and disease. Fermented foods and beverages are generally defined as products made by microbial organisms and enzymatic conversions of major and minor food components. Further to the commonly-recognized effects of nutrition on the digestive health (e.g., dysbiosis) and well-being, there is now strong evidence for the impact of fermented foods and beverages (e.g., yoghurt, pickles, bread, kefir, beers, wines, mead), produced or preserved by the action of microorganisms, on general health, namely their significance on the gut microbiota balance and brain functionality. Fermented products require microorganisms, i.e., Saccharomyces yeasts and lactic acid bacteria, yielding alcohol and lactic acid. Ingestion of vibrant probiotics, especially those contained in fermented foods, is found to cause significant positive improvements in balancing intestinal permeability and barrier function. Our guts control and deal with every aspect of our health. How we digest our food and even the food sensitivities we have is linked with our mood, behavior, energy, weight, food cravings, hormone balance, immunity, and overall wellness. We highlight some impacts in this domain and debate calls for the convergence of interdisciplinary research fields from the United Nations’ initiative. Worldwide human and animal medicine are practiced separately; veterinary science and animal health are generally neither considered nor inserted within national or international Health discussions. The absence of a clear definition and subsequent vision for the future of One Health may act as a barrier to transdisciplinary collaboration. The point of this mini review is to highlight the role of fermented foods and beverages on gut microbiota and debate if the need for confluence of transdisciplinary fields of One Health is feasible and achievable, since they are managed by separate sectors with limited communication.

scholarly journals One Health, emerging infectious diseases and wildlife: two decades of progress?

2017 ◽  
Vol 372 (1725) ◽  
pp. 20160167 ◽  
Author(s):  
Andrew A. Cunningham ◽  
Peter Daszak ◽  
James L. N. Wood
Keyword(s):  
Infectious Diseases ◽  
Wildlife Conservation ◽  
One Health ◽  
Emerging Infectious Diseases ◽  
Well Being ◽  
Wildlife Habitat ◽  
Health And Wellbeing ◽  
Underlying Causes ◽  
Wide Scale ◽  
Multiple Species

Infectious diseases affect people, domestic animals and wildlife alike, with many pathogens being able to infect multiple species. Fifty years ago, following the wide-scale manufacture and use of antibiotics and vaccines, it seemed that the battle against infections was being won for the human population. Since then, however, and in addition to increasing antimicrobial resistance among bacterial pathogens, there has been an increase in the emergence of, mostly viral, zoonotic diseases from wildlife, sometimes causing fatal outbreaks of epidemic proportions. Concurrently, infectious disease has been identified as an increasing threat to wildlife conservation. A synthesis published in 2000 showed common anthropogenic drivers of disease threats to biodiversity and human health, including encroachment and destruction of wildlife habitat and the human-assisted spread of pathogens. Almost two decades later, the situation has not changed and, despite improved knowledge of the underlying causes, little has been done at the policy level to address these threats. For the sake of public health and wellbeing, human-kind needs to work better to conserve nature and preserve the ecosystem services, including disease regulation, that biodiversity provides while also understanding and mitigating activities which lead to disease emergence. We consider that holistic, One Health approaches to the management and mitigation of the risks of emerging infectious diseases have the greatest chance of success. This article is part of the themed issue ‘One Health for a changing world: zoonoses, ecosystems and human well-being’.

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