June 19, 2018 | EcoHealth Alliance Liberia: Chimpanzees, Wildlife Trade, and Emerging Disease – One Health in Action
Dr. James Desmond will discuss the pursuit of the wildlife reservoir for the Ebola Virus through USAID’s PREDICT project, establishing a chimpanzee sanctuary and combating wildlife trade, the challenges of working in a resource poor post-conflict nation that is at the forefront of utilizing a One Health approach as part of an overall public health strategy.
About the Presenter:
Since receiving a Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree and a Masters degree in Comparative Biomedical Sciences at Tufts University, Dr. Desmond has worked as a wildlife veterinarian and a consultant specializing in emerging infectious diseases and wildlife trade. He has consulted for several international NGO’s including EcoHealth Alliance, Smithsonian Institution, Jane Goodall Institute, Humane Society of the United States and the Pan African Sanctuary Alliance (PASA). As a consultant, he has worked in many countries around the world conducting field based infectious disease research. In addition, he and his wife have consulted with several PASA sanctuaries focused on conservation and primate care and welfare. He currently resides in Charlesville, Liberia with his wife where they have established a chimpanzee sanctuary whose aim is to provide refuge for chimpanzees orphaned by the bushmeat and wildlife trade industry. In addition, he manages a large scale research study funded by USAID and focused on identifying the wildlife reservoir for Ebola virus.
February 21, 2018 | Market Failures and Their Environmental Consequences Most of the time, economic markets are beneficial to society, allowing people to exchange goods and services, creating value for everyone. During the last century, markets and economic development have also allowed most people around the globe to improve their livelihoods. However, from pollution to pandemics, there has never been a moment in history with more environmental concerns than today. Markets are not always beneficial for us and the environment, and many times markets – and their absence – make us worse off. Sometimes it is people’s actions through markets that fail to provide the highest welfare to societies, while other times, markets do not exist for some of the most important services that nature provides us, like clean air. This webinar will explore how the field of economics addresses some environmental issues such as market failures, how to think about these issues in economic terms, and the solutions the field of environmental economics proposes in order to solve these. The webinar will show how human, animal, and environmental health are all interconnected and how market failures have consequences on the them. About the Presenter: Dr. Yasha Feferholtz is an economist at EcoHealth Alliance studying the economic consequences of emerging infectious diseases and human health and the economic impacts of land use change. Using empirical data and mathematical models, Dr. Feferholtz explores how environmental conservation and sustainable economic development can dovetail to improve human, animal and environmental health and wellbeing. Yasha received a Fulbright scholarship to study his Ph.D. in economics at the University of Wyoming. He specializes in environmental and behavioral economics.
February 13, 2018 | Pandemics & Policy: Using Science to Support Domestic and Global Health Security Policy Decisions
How does EcoHealth Alliance use strong science to encourage good policy? This webinar will introduce some of EcoHealth’s work to support improved decision-making at the highest levels of government. It will provide some examples of our efforts to develop recommendations for domestic biodefense governance, and for health security on a global scale. It will conclude with a perspective on prospects for sustained government support for domestic and global pre-pandemic efforts.
December 18, 2017 | Using Networks to Study Zoonotic Pathogens
The survival of zoonotic pathogens, and ultimately their spread and spillover into humans, depends on transmission between hosts and vectors. One tool to explore these transmission dynamics are biological networks. We will walk through the construction, analysis, and predictive insights from networks that EcoHealth Alliance uses to study zoonotic pathogens. Through several case studies of pathogen networks at the multiple scales we will highlight disease risk among individuals, species, and locations.
About the Presenter:
Anna is a Research Assistant at EcoHealth Alliance, where she works on a variety of modeling and analytical projects for the USAID PREDICT project. She first applied networks while studying primate social dynamics at Duke University, where she received a BS in Evolutionary Anthropology. Anna now focuses on the dynamics of viral sharing.
November 20, 2017 | Understanding the Wildlife Trade in China – Do we know what’s going on?
Ivory, rhinoceros horns, tiger bones, pangolin scales, shark fins. when we talk about wildlife trade, internationally or locally in China, these “flagship” species have been the hottest topics, and every species has their own story. How did a pangolin go from the forest to the dinner table? Why are people so fond of these unusual foods like shark fin? How was the ivory trade was banned in China?
Some stories and preliminary study findings from China will show us the wildlife trade is far more complicated and interesting than what we think we know. And with these findings, we are trying to develop strategies to reduce the human-wildlife contacts in wildlife trade, to protect the health of human population and wild animals.
November 17, 2017 | The Global Virome Project
The incidence of emerging infectious disease events is on the rise, driven by expanding human populations, changes in land use, and interconnected global travel and trade. A large majority of these diseases, including SARS, MERS, Avian Influenza, and Ebola, are zoonoses caused by spillover from wildlife into human populations. These events can become pandemic and can devastate global networks and economies, but response strategies to novel viruses are necessarily reactive rather than preventative.
The Global Virome Project is an ambitious proposal to discover the majority of the world’s potential zoonoses before they spillover into humans by sampling and testing their mammalian and waterfowl host. In this webinar, we will discuss the rationale, mission, proof of concept, and strategy for the Global Virome Project.
Download slides (archived recording unavailable)
October 19, 2017 | One Health Approaches for Health Disaster Risk Reduction
March 8, 2017 | Outcomes of the OneHealth EcoHealth Conference
Professor Kerry Arabena is Chair of Indigenous Health and Director of the Indigenous Health Equity Unit at The University of Melbourne. A descendent of the Meriam people from the Torres Strait, she has a Doctorate in Human Ecology and a degree in Social Work. She is the Lead Investigator on the Australian Model of the First 1000 Days Study, an interventions based pre-birth cohort study designed with and for Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander families. Her work has made significant contributions in areas such as sexual and reproductive health, family violence, gender issues and eco-health.
February 28, 2017 | Health, Economics, and Land Use Change
Land-use change is a significant driver of emerging infectious disease. Over 60 percent of emerging infectious diseases over the past six decades have originated in animals, with nearly half of these linked to changes in land-use. This talk highlights the work of the Infectious Disease Emergence and Economics of Altered Landscapes (IDEEAL) project, which uses economic modeling to explore the costs and benefits of land use change, incorporating ecosystem services and disease outbreaks, promotes local research, and builds tools to communicate these results to policy-makers, communities, and private sector organizations.
Presenter: As an EcoHealth Alliance (EHA) Research Scientist, Allison White focuses on using spatial analysis and other statistical techniques to examine the emergence of infectious diseases. She also works on knowledge translation projects communicating scientific evidence to communities and stakeholders. Prior to her work at EHA, she spent three years in Botswana doing working on community health and HIV&AIDS services at a rural clinic. Allison holds a BA in Public Health Studies from Johns Hopkins University, and an MPH in Global Epidemiology from Emory University.
June 29, 2016 |Animal source food: Hazards don’t always translate into risks
Ecohealth from West Africa: a regional webinar from the hosts of the Ecohealth 2013 regional conference in Abidijan, Ivory Coast. Informal markets are the major supplier of animal source food (ASF) in Africa, where they generate income, provide high nutritional value and are well suited to the small farm production system. However informal markets are non-transparent and vulnerable to practices which can compromise food safety because enforcing effective health and hygiene regulations is challenging. Producers in informal markets face rising standards for safety and quality; however, risk-based approaches to assess the likelihood of harm to human health are difficult to apply under such conditions. Since 2000, case studies on risk analysis of ASF (milk, meat and fish) in West Africa reveal that analysis should consider relations between stakeholders and include consideration of technology, gender, poverty, participation, market incentives and culture. This necessitates adopting the new approach of participatory risk analysis fitting within the ecohealth and one health thinking to address complex health problems. It appears that ASF sold in the informal sector often contains hazards, but this does not necessarily mean that the food products are harmful to human health. Culture, especially as it relates to traditional food preparation, is a key factor in food safety. Gender can be surprisingly effective in risk management. Food safety problems are often better solved through stakeholder engagement, using market incentives rather than public health regulation and enforcement alone. Presenters: Bassirou Bonfoh Bassirou Bonfoh is specialised in epidemiology and veterinary public health after four years as a Postdoctoral fellow at ETH Zurich and the Swiss Tropical Institute in Basel. Since 2009, he has been the managing Director of Centre Suisse de Recherches Scientifiques en Côte d’Ivoire (CSRS – www.csrs.ch), Director of the Consortium Afrique One “Ecosystem and Population health: expanding frontiers in health” supported by the Wellcome Trust African Institution Initiative. He was regional coordinator of the Swiss National Competence in Research North-South and coordinator of the “Safe Food, Fair Food” program in West Africa. Bassirou Bonfoh is the architect of the Malian dairy sector with the project “Healthy milk for the Sahel”. He has also been leading a pastoralism project in West Africa, Horn of Africa and Central Asia. Gilbert Fokou Gilbert Fokou is a social anthropologist and senior researcher at the Centre Suisse de Recherches Scientifiques en Côte d’Ivoire (CSRS) where he is the coordinator of the social science group. He has conducted studies on participatory risks and analysis and quality of animal source foods (milk and meat) in Mali, Senegal and Côte d’Ivoire. He is particularly interested in perception of risks and quality as well as local risk management. His main research foci are: institutions for common property resources management, environmental conflicts, and institutions and mechanisms regulating access of pastoral communities to natural resources and basic social services.
May 4, 2016 | On the Front Lines of the Zika Virus Epidemic in the Americas
Zika virus was discovered in Uganda in 1947, however in May 2015, Zika virus was identified in Brazil for the first time.Brazil is currently experiencing an unprecedented epidemic, with >30,000 cases reported to date. Infection typically results in a mild disease consisting of flu-like symptoms and rash, however, it has now also been linked to severe birth defects, including microcephaly, when women are infected during pregnancy, and neurological disease in adults. Besides vector-borne and mother-to-child transmission, Zika virus may also spread via sexual contact and blood transfusion. In addition to Brazil, there are active outbreaks of Zika virus occurring in several countries, including the United States. It is anticipated that there will be an increase in Zika virus transmission in the United States this year as the mosquito vector becomes more active.
The International Association of Ecology and Health (IAEH) and EcoHealth Alliance are proud to present a live discussion via webinar with two scientists on the frontlines of Zika virus research and prevention. Dr. Felipe Naveca is the Deputy Director of research at FIOCRUZ ILMD Amazon institute in Manaus, Brazil where he is working to develop diagnostic tests and control methods for the mosquito vector of Zika virus. Dr. Jay Varma is the Deputy Director of Infectious Disease at the New York City Department of Health and is preparing for the spread of Zika in New York City and the United States.
Presentations will include:
• Zika virus emergence and epidemiology
• Zika virus clinical infection and atypical symptoms: what we know so far
• Challenges of Zika virus laboratory diagnosis
• Alternative methods for vector control: The Brazilian experience
• How New York City is preparing the public and healthcare providers for preventing and managing Zika infections
• How New York City is adapting its mosquito control program to address the threat of Zika virus
There will be a moderated discussion with the speakers, including questions from the audience, following the two presentations.
Moderator:
Dr. Jon Epstein, EcoHealth Alliance, New York, NY USA
Presenters:
Dr. Jay Varma, New York City Department of Health
Dr. Felipe Naveca, FIOCRUZ ILMD Amazon Institute, Brazil
March 16, 2016 | Post Graduate Pathways and Experiences: Integrating Ecohealth into Development After completing the ecohealth field school in 2013 and 2014, Alexandra and Kate have been negotiating the challenge of integrating ecohealth principles and practice into their careers. This talk will centre around how they have decided to integrate ecohealth and development in Malawi and Uganda, outlining some of the challenges and experiences they have had. Speakers Alexandra Belaskie, HBSc, MES, Intern with Canadian Physicians for Aid and Relief in Malawi as part of the International Youth Internship Program sponsored by Global Affairs Canada Kate Bishop-Williams, BSc, MSc, PhD Candidate, University of Guelph.
February 10, 2016 | Write Shop: Getting Your Work Published
Ecohealth Journal Editor-In-Chief Dr. Peter Daszak discusses the process of drafting and submitting a manuscript for publication in a scientific journal. He covers choosing the right journal, writing abstracts, maximizing your impact, and more.
Peter Daszak, EcoHealth Alliance, New York, NY
December 14, 2015 | Ecohealth/One Health Interest and participation in Ecohealth and One Health approaches have grown considerably over the past decade. The two approaches have many similarities and strive for similar outcomes. Drawing on expertise from the IAEH Board of Directors, this webinar discusses the origin and application of these two concepts, and elaborates reasons for this renewed interested in inter- and transdisciplinary approaches and the opportunities this provides for professionals interested in social-ecological interactions and their links to human and animal health. Jon Epstein, (moderator) EcoHealth Alliance, New York, United States Panelists Jakob Zinsstag, Swiss Tropical and Public Health Institute, Basel, Switzerland Nitish Debnath, Chittagong Veterinary and Animal Sciences University, Bangladesh Moses Chimbari, University of KwaZulu-Natal, Durban, South Africa Karen Morrison, York University, Ontario, Canada Martyn Jeggo, Chair, Ecohealth/One Health Conference 2016