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One Health Concept: Why is It in News Now

In this lecture we are going to learn about the World Health Organisation (WHO), National Mission on Biodiversity and Human Well Being, health care for people, One Health at SCI Foundation and many other things.

One Health is a way of looking at health that takes into account the fact that people and animals live in the same environment and that working together on problems that affect more than one sector can be helpful. “A method for planning and implementing programmes, policies, laws, and research in which different sectors communicate and work together to improve public health outcomes,” says the World Health Organisation.

World Health Organisation (WHO):

The World Health Organisation (WHO) is a specialised UN agency in charge of public health around the world. According to the WHO’s constitution, the main goal of the organisation is for “all peoples to achieve the highest possible level of health.” Its main office is in Geneva, Switzerland, and it has 150 field offices in different parts of the world. The World Health Organisation (WHO) was set up on April 7, 1948. On July 24, that year, the agency’s governing body, the World Health Assembly (WHA), held its first meeting. The assets, people, and jobs of the League of Nations’ Health Organisation and the Office International d’Hygiène Publique were taken over by the World Health Organisation (WHO). This included the International Classification of Diseases (ICD). After getting a lot of money and technology, it started working seriously in 1951.

National Mission on Biodiversity and Human Well Being:

The National Mission on Biodiversity and Human Well-Being is a large-scale initiative in India that aims to bring biodiversity and conservation to the forefront of science, policy, and society. The Mission has been designed to be as inclusive as possible, with components involving national, state, and local scientific institutions, government agencies, and non-government organisations. Scientists, farmers, industrialists, students, policymakers, and citizens from all walks of life will be among those who will power the Mission. According to recent studies, India has one of the world’s largest ecological footprints, and significant changes in India’s social, economic, and environmental systems are jeopardising the country’s biodiversity. India may lose a significant portion of its biodiversity if no action is taken now. Biodiversity benefits India’s people in a variety of ways – it influences the food they consume, their health, and provides protection from natural disasters – and this is shown by how biodiversity is woven into many of our country’s traditional customs. The natural services linked with biodiversity given by India’s forests alone are valued at $128 trillion per year from an economic standpoint. However, in India, biodiversity science and its linkages to human well-being are generally overlooked and ignored. Only a small percentage of India’s vast human population is aware of the function and significance of biodiversity in their daily lives.

Health care for people:

High-quality health care can help people avoid diseases and live longer. Healthy People 2030 focuses on enhancing health-care quality and ensuring that everyone has access to the services they require. Improving health and well-being through supporting health care providers in more effectively communicating. Improving health also necessitates initiatives to ensure that health-care practitioners are informed of treatment recommendations and services that have been suggested. Some people don’t get the medical care they need because they don’t have health insurance or live too far away from doctors who do. More individuals can get the care they need if interventions to expand access to health care services are implemented, such as cutting costs, enhancing insurance coverage, and boosting the use of telehealth.

One Health at SCI Foundation

We want to improve people’s health through collaborating with different partners who work in animal, human, and environmental health. Our strategy goes beyond treating parasitic worms in people and aims to change population behaviour to reduce transmission between humans and between humans and animals, address environmental transmission factors, and improve access to all basic services, such as healthcare, water, sanitation, and education. We also look into how control tactics for several pathogens might be combined, such as the usefulness of schistosomiasis medicines for disorders caused by pork tapeworms.

Conclusion

The One Health concept improves coordination, collaboration, and communication at the human-animal-environment interface to address common health issues such as zoonotic infections, antibiotic resistance, food safety, and others. Over the last ten years, country after country has adopted the One Health strategy, with measurable results. However, in order to ensure the long-term viability of these efforts, One Health champions and implementers must gather and deliver country-level statistics on One Health’s impact to government decision-makers to help explain policy decisions and budget allocations. The One Health community has struggled to determine particular One Health impact indicators for publicly measuring One Health successes due to the wide, often all-encompassing nature of One Health in creating synergy of different disciplines and industries.

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Frequently asked questions

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What does it mean to have a One Health approach?

Answer. One Health is a collaborative, multisectoral, and transdisciplinary way to get the best health outcomes by r...Read full

What are the three elements that make up the One Health concept?

Answer. When people, animals, and the environment are combined, the One Health Triad is formed. The One Health Triad...Read full

What is an example of One Health?

Answer. Zoonotic illnesses, antibiotic resistance, food safety and security, vector-borne diseases, environmental co...Read full

When did the phrase "One Health" first appear?

Answer. In 1984, Calvin Schwabe coined the concept “One Care,” realising that human and veterinary medic...Read full

What is the One Health Commission, and what does it do?

Answer. The One Health Commission is THE coordinating body that brings together human, animal, and environmental sci...Read full