GS Paper 3
Syllabus: Environment Conservation
Source: DTE
Direction: ‘One Health’, ‘One Water’ are important concepts. Do keep a note on it.
Context: FAO, UNEP, WHO and World Organization for Animal Health have together launched One Health joint plan of action to address health threats to humans, plants and the environment .
One Health is an approach calling for “the collaborative efforts of multiple disciplines working locally, nationally, and globally, to attain optimal health for people, animals and our environment”, as defined by the One Health Initiative Task Force
Action Plan :
- Enhance capacities to strengthen the health system
- Reduce risk from zoonotic epidemics and pandemics .
- Control and eliminate zoonotic, neglected tropical and vector-borne diseases
- Assess, manage and communicate effectively food safety risks
- Curb Antimicrobial Resistance ( termed as ‘silent pandemic’)
- Environment and health Policies must be integrated into One Health
Need for One Health:
- Human health cannot be considered in isolation– It depends highly on the quality of the environment in which people live: for people to be healthy, they need healthy environments.
- Increasing temperatures are supporting range expansion for disease vectors, with the resulting spread of vector-borne diseases expected in humans and animals.
- Temperature-related mortality alone is expected to rise to rival current levels of obesity- and diet-related illness.
- COVID-19 and intersections with the climate-health crisis
- Growing water and food insecurity and safety hazards
What more needs to be done?
- Mainstream health into climate change and biodiversity agendas and fund health programs within the UNFCCC.
- Integrate health impact assessment in all development project appraisals
- Assess and quantify the health co-benefits of proposed environmental investments (e.g. REDD+)
- Increase application of existing climate and health forecasting tools and early warning systems for human and animal health (such as those promoted by the WMO-WHO joint office)
Conclusion:
The ecosystem-based approach to Healthcare exists at the interface between the health of humans, animals, and ecosystems and recognizes the inextricable linkages between the health of all species and their environments. A basic tenet held is that health and well-being cannot be sustained on a resource-depleted, polluted, and socially unstable planet.
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Q. What do you understand by the ‘one health approach’? Examine its role in preventing the outbreak of various infections. (250 words)
