One Health Surveillance

Data collected at livestock slaughter can be a useful source of non-specific health indicators including clinical signs, symptoms and proxy measures [1]. When monitored in near real-time, this data can enable the detection of both livestock and human health threats [1]. In the United States (US), the Federal Meat Inspection Act requires ante-mortem inspection of animals and post-mortem inspection of carcasses by veterinarians to ensure the meat product will be fit for human consumption [2]. Inspections are carried out by the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) Food Safety Inspection Service (FSIS) and results are recorded in the Public Health Information System (PHIS), including the reason for condemnation if the animal or carcass is deemed unfit. Since April 2016 the USDA, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS), Veterinary Services (VS) has used data from the PHIS to monitor changes in the weekly count/rate of cattle condemnations for three cattle types, beef cows, dairy cows, and fed cattle (steers and heifers), and for selected condemnation reasons (central nervous system (CNS), dead, emaciation, mastitis, moribund, pneumonia, pyrexia, and septicemia). These eight reasons were chosen from 45 potential reasons recorded at condemnation as likely to identify clinical signs associated with foreign animal diseases of interest and to monitor trends in important animal health issues such as pneumonia and mastitis.

Objective: Use United States cattle slaughter condemnation data as an animal health indicator for early detection of health events and to characterize trends in condemnation reasons.

Ticks and tick-borne diseases have been thought global important issues, because it's affect to animal and human health and are the cause of significant economic losses. The genus Ornithodoros spp., which is included in Family Argasidae, is usually associated with wild animals including seabirds and it was difficult to investigate because seabirds'™ nests are found in inaccessible uninhabited islands. However, Ornithodoros spp. has been known for the vector of many diseases including African swine fever.

Objective: The aim of this study is to survey data of ticks distribution of Korean islands and to investigate pathogens in Argasid ticks.

Dogs, cats and other companion animals have played an integral role in many aspects of human life. Human and companion animal (CAs) interactions have a wide range of benefits to human health [1-3]. The threat of zoonotic transmission between CAs and humans is exacerbated by proximity (56% of dog owners and 62% of cat owners sleep with their animal next to them [4]) and the number of diseases CAs share with humans. Many of these highlighted zoonoses are spread by direct contact, and others are vector-transmitted (e.g., fleas, ticks, flies, and mosquitos). Within the realm of the One-Health concept, CAs can serve multiple roles in zoonotic transmission chains between humans and animals. They can serve as intermediate hosts between wildlife reservoirs and humans, or as possible sentinel or proxy species for emerging diseases [5]. Given the large number of CAs within the United States (estimated 72 million pet dogs, 81 million pet cats), understanding and preventing the diseases prevalent in CA populations is of utmost importance. Biosurveillance is a critical component of One Health initiatives including zoonotic disease mitigation and control. As Lead Service for Veterinary Animal and Public Health Services, the Army has a responsibility to champion biosurveillance efforts to support One Health initiatives, improving Servicemember, family, and retiree health across the Joint Force. Additionally, with military personnel experiencing apparent increased rates of job-reducing ailments such as diarrheal, bacterial and viral disease [6- 8], it is essential that the Army focus on maximizing their operational potential by minimizing the amount of time personnel are sick from these transmissible diseases and observing potential sources of infection. By observing the zoonotic disease burden in privately owned (POAs) and government-owned (GOAs) animals, public health investigators can increase focus on what transmittable diseases are at greatest risk of being spread from companion animals to military personnel. To address this potential source of infection, the Department of Defense (DoD) sought and continues to seek to establish a centralized and integrated veterinary zoonotic surveillance system to provide Commanders with a clear picture of disease burden [9]. With this assigned responsibility, the Army Veterinary Service (VS) seeks to centralize and enhance surveillance efforts through the Remote Online Veterinary Record (ROVR) Electronic Health Record (EHR), an enterprise web-based application to support the Army VS, accurately establishing a zoonotic epidemiological baseline and sustaining consistent future reporting.

Objective: We assesed the feasibility of a zoonotic disease surveillance system through the current EHR (ROVR) for all POAs and GOAs. Additionally, we conducted a retrospective observational study querying and collecting reported zoonoses of interest, for 2017.

Anthrax is a widely spread zoonotic disease with natural transmissive cycle involving wildlife, livestock and humans [1]. It is caused by Bacillus anthracis, a highly pathogenic gram-positive, spore-producing bacterium, which poses a serious threat to public and animal health due to its mortality both for animals and for humans [2, 3, 4]. The ability of B. anthracis spores to remain viable in soils for decades enables their isolation from freely accessible environment [5]. This unique feature to form highly resistant spores in the environment plays a major role in the ecology and evolution of this pathogen [6]. During the spore phase, evolution is greatly reduced in rate, which limits the amount of genetic diversity found among isolates of this species [1]. All these factors demonstrate the need for reliable anthrax diagnosis and trace-back methods. This comprises bio forensic capabilities including state-of-the-art methods for accurate genotyping of B. anthracis strains.

Objective: Due to the lack of information about the phylogenetic origins of Ukrainian Bacillus anthracis strains, the goal of this work was to make phylogenetic analysis of Ukrainian isolates obtained from various sources (soil, clinical material from infected humans and animal products) for better understanding of phylogenetic origins of this pathogen in Ukraine and Eastern Europe.

Disease surveillance systems can be based on two components of surveillance: active surveillance in which the diseases are looked for on a regular basis in a defined population, and passive surveillance where the diseases are looked for whenever specific sanitary events are notified. The first type of surveillance is fundamental to detect clinically unexpressed infections and to estimate the prevalence of the disease in the global population. The second type of surveillance is essential to detect new disease cases as early as possible after their appearance, and necessitates a clinical expression of infections. Active surveillance is more complete but also takes more resources to be implemented. As for passive surveillance, although it has the advantage of sparing resources, it is subject to variability in data reporting according to the reporters. A recent study was conducted in France on a specific data reporting in veterinary public health: the declaration of bovine abortions1. It is the main clinical sign for some diseases that can have a serious economic impact on the production and that can be transmittable to humans. This study has highlighted individual obstacles to abortion declaration by farmers and veterinarians, but it has also shown that in different departments of France with the same bovine farming characteristics (similar types of production, mean sizes of the farms, density of farms, etc.), large differences could be observed regarding their abortion declaration rate (a department is a French administrative and territorial division covering a mean surface area of 5,800 km2). This result suggests that there is another level of factors influencing data reporting, different from the individual factors related to the characteristics of the farms. We formulated the hypothesis that these other factors were related to the local governance of animal health surveillance data collection. Our study was thus developed in the continuity of this previous research to explore the variation of data reporting in relation with the organisation of animal health surveillance actors of bovine production at the local level. In France, an official organisation chart sets how actors should act and interact with one another at the national, regional and departmental scales, and yet some differences can be observed at the departmental level, mostly regarding the relations between actors, due to a difference in the resources available for each actor according to the local context.

Objective: The objectives were to understand the functioning of the local network of actors involved in the French bovine infectious diseases surveillance system and the influence of their organisation on data reporting from the field.

Rabies is a zoonotic, neglected viral disease. Every 10 minutes, the world loses a life, especially children, to dog-mediated rabies. Yet it is 100% preventable. Africa, including Nigeria, has major share of the disease. Eradication of human rabies relies majorly on control of rabies in animals and this cannot be achieved without good surveillance system of the disease in animal, especially dogs. There is little or no information as to whether the surveillance system in Nigeria is effective.

Objective: The objectives of this study are to evaluate the current animal rabies surveillance system in the state and suggest recommendations.

Rabies control programmes are being implemented across the Philippines, with a number of islands and provinces on track for the elimination of both human and dog rabies [1,2]. In spite of considerable progress in control programmes, costs of post exposure prophylaxis (PEP) remain high with bite incidence rapidly increasing every year. Indiscriminate PEP administration can strain healthcare budgets, and eventually redirect focus from essential mass dog vaccination campaigns. It is an ethical imperative to improve access to PEP for those at risk; however, under the current framework operating in the Philippines, indiscriminate PEP administration results in excessive expenditure on non-case patients and subsequent financial strains and vaccine shortages, whilst vulnerable communities remain undetected. At the same time, incursions represent an obstacle to achieving and maintaining rabies freedom [3,4]and have been shown to pose a threat to elimination goals [5]. The lack of formal surveillance is the primary cause, leading to late detection of disease at which point substantial secondary transmission within the dog population already occurs. There is, therefore, an urgent need to enhance and streamline surveillance to maximize detection potential for rapid outbreak response and to guide policy decisions regarding public health practice. Workable surveillance criteria are needed for more judicious and effectiveuse of PEP to identify high risk exposures and thus prevent unnecessary risk and further transmission when vaccine stocks are limited.

Objective: To evaluate public health and economic impact of intersectoral One Health enhanced surveillance strategies of canine rabies in the Philippines to inform vaccine procurement and provision plans.

Q fever is a zoonotic bacterial disease resulting from infection by Coxiella burnetii. Domestic ruminants (cattle, sheep, and goats) are considered the main reservoir for the pathogen, which can also infect humans. Q fever is poorly understood in Georgia and its prevalence is largely underestimated in both humans and animals. In Georgia Q fever laboratory diagnostic was started and implemented at the Laboratory of the Ministry of Georgia (LMA) within GG20 "Prevalence, Epidemiological Surveillance, and Laboratory Analysis of Coxiella burnetii in Georgia.

Objective: Q fever is poorly understood in Georgia and its prevalence is largely underestimated in both humans and animals. One of the main goal of the project was shedding study in domestic animals isolation of C. burnetii from suspected seropositive animal blood, milk samples.

In 2012 - 2017 in Azerbaijan there was an unexpected increase of abortions in cattle and sheep that was unrelated to brucellosis or chlamydia infection. The first confirmed case of Schmallenberg disease was received from Beylagan district of Azerbaijan in October 2012. The import of cattle from Europe to Azerbaijan has commenced in 2012. Therefore, the surveillance study was launched to determine spread of infection among cattle and sheep and to monitor the situation in the country.

Objective: Schmallenberg virus (SBV) is an orthobunyavirus that primarily infects domestic and wild ruminants and causes symptoms such as transient fever, diarrhea, reduced milk production, congenital malformations and abortion. The first virus was identified in 2011 at the onset of a major outbreak in Europe (Germany, Hungary, and France).

Although in E. Africa RVF was initially detected and known to be a disease endermic in Kenya, the people in Uganda were still hesitating wether the disease is already in existence. Following its first detection in 2016 in Humans there was need to carry out an investigation in the hot spot areas of the human infection to get the real picture and to inform the policy makers for informed decisions. Rift Valley fiver is viral zoonotic disease which was investigated and reported in Uganda in 20101. For some time now people are not aware whether the disease was still circulating or emerged in animals reared as a result of the inter country trade by the community of the cattle corridor in Uganda, since the last reports in 19682. The increase in the number of disease outbreaks in some parts of central and western Uganda from 2016 to date and the number of human patients investigated, diagnosed and confirmed with RVF by Ministry Of Health (MOH) under the one health program, has placed the disease to be among the top re-emerging diseases in the country3&4 and number 5 of the Multisectoral prioritization of zoonotic diseases in Uganda, 2017 under One Health perspective.

Objective: To detect presence of circulating Rift Valley Fever virus (RVFv) in animals of Western and Central Uganda following its confirmation in humans. To establish and communicate reliable information using the one health platform.