"It is only through challenging existing systems and structures that we can address global health challenges from a One Health perspective. There is a wealth of evidence and knowledge across disciplines. Our task is to mobilise this knowledge into tangible improvements in global health."
Andrew Farlow, Senior Research Fellow and symposium organiser
One Health describes the interconnectedness of human, animal, and environmental health. The One Health approach is integral to combating antimicrobial resistance (AMR), because resistant microbes can spread across these sectors, including health-care facilities, animals, food, and the environment. Resistant infections are more challenging to treat and pose an increased risk of disease spread, severe illness, and death.
On 16 July the Lancet Commission published its report on One Health. Ahead of publication, experts from across the UK, Germany, Norway, and Ghana gathered in Oxford to explore how a One Health approach can be mobilised to tackle global health challenges including AMR.
The two joint Chairs of The Lancet One Health Commission, Professor Andrea Winkler and Professor John Amuasi, introduced the key report findings, with 27 speakers adding their perspectives across five discussion panels. Topics explored included infection, prevention and control (IPC) measures and resourcing, food systems, climate change and governance.
The panels identified future priorities around key areas of action:
- Data sharing - Improved integration of human, animal, and environmental data through consistent, national and local data infrastructures, incorporating privacy-protecting machine learning tools.
- Surveillance - Fill surveillance gaps in metagenomics and pathogen mapping, improve passive sampling strategies, and strengthen the contextualisation of genomic surveillance with baseline clinical and environmental data to enhance its value and usage.
- Infection prevention- Support new locally driven tools such as climate-adaptive, community-led water monitoring and reporting systems and linked metagenomics. Focus on low-cost, high-impact interventions that address sanitation gaps.
- Food systems - Improve farming and aquaculture IPC to reduce pathogen load. Recognise the relationship between equity, nutrition, and One Health by incorporating nutrition, especially for vulnerable populations, into AMR National Action Plans.
- Vaccines- Invest in cross-species, cross-pathogen vaccine research, utilising vaccines to reduce antibiotic use. Develop understanding of both cross-species vaccine immunological differences and vaccine regulatory frameworks.
- Microbiology - Analyse microbiomes as sentinels for planetary health, and invest in fully unpacking the links between pollution, climate change, microbiomes, and animal and human health.
- Governance - Address governance gaps in regulation of environmental AMR (including wastewater). Integrate and coordinate existing governance structures rather than invent new governance structures.