Not less than 200 policymakers,
development partners, public health experts and advocates from West
Africa and around the world will gather on the 8th to 11th November to
highlight the importance of addressing emerging health threats using a
‘One Health’ approach – one that takes into account the inextricable
link between the health of humans, animals and their environments.
According
to One Health organisers, an estimated 75 per cent of infectious
diseases that have emerged over the past decade have been caused by
pathogens that spread to people from animals or animal products, with
trends like globalisation, urbanisation and climate change making it
easy for ‘zoonotic’ diseases to transfer to humans and spread quickly
around the world.
“The
recent Ebola Virus Disease outbreak in West Africa is a prime example
of this; a single case of the virus in a remote village, likely
contracted through an infected animal, ultimately spread between more
than 28,000 people, including in urban capital cities of six West
African countries, namely Guinea, Liberia, Mali, Nigeria, Senegal and
Sierra Leone,” the group said.
At
the upcoming conference, regional and global leaders will discuss
strategies for predicting, preventing, detecting and responding to
emerging health threats across the region by collectively addressing the
health of people, animals and the environment. Ministers responsible
for human health, animal health and wildlife from 17 West African
countries will participate.
The
first three days of the event will consist of technical meetings in
which health officials and technical personnel will focus on next steps
for integrating One Health approaches into existing regional and
country-level systems and programmes. At the Ministerial Meeting on the
last day, attending ministers for human health, animal health and
wildlife will put forth a communiqué to guide future action for the West
African sub-region.
This
event is being hosted by the World Health Organisation’s Regional
Office for Africa, the UN Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the
World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE), the Economic Community of
West African States (ECOWAS) Commission – including its West African
Health Organisation (WAHO) and Regional Animal Health Center (RAHC) –
the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID), the World Bank
and the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC).
By: Martins Ifijeh
This Day Live News
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