NEW Fogarty Funding Opportunities: Upcoming Deadlines

·         NEW International Research Scientist Development Award (IRSDA) (K01) - Deadline March 1, 2010

     http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PAR-10-066.html

Purpose:  This program supports U.S. postdoctoral biomedical, epidemiological, clinical, social and behavioral scientists in the formative stages of their careers to conduct research in developing countries.  These awards will support three- to five-years of “protected time” for  mentored research and career development experiences, leading to an independent research career focused on global health. 

Mechanism of Support: This FOA will utilize the K01 award mechanism.

·         NEW Independent Scientist in Global Health Award (ISGHA) (K02) - Deadline March 1, 2010

              http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PAR-10-065.html

Purpose:  The purpose of the Independent Scientist Award in Global Health (K02) is to foster the development of outstanding scientists and enable them to expand their potential to make significant contributions to their field of research in global health.  The K02 award provides three, four, or five years of research and salary support, and “protected time” for newly independent scientists who can demonstrate the need for a period of intensive research focus as a means of enhancing their research careers. Each independent scientist career award program must be tailored to meet the individual needs of the candidate. 

Below is the recently released research agenda/policy of the new NIH Director, Francis S. Collins, MD, PhD that includes this portion:

Focusing More on Global Health

Much of recent global health research has justifiably been focused on AIDS, tuberculosis, and malaria (11). It is also critical to go beyond the focus on the "big three" diseases to neglected tropical diseases of low-income countries that contribute to staggering levels of morbidity and mortality. In collaboration with other sources of support such as the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation, NIH can play a major role in ramping up the discovery of novel targets in both pathogen and host and work to facilitate advances in prevention, diagnostics, and therapeutics. Helping to build capacity and training opportunities in the developing world will be a critical component of such progress. Additional resources will also be needed to respond to the growing challenge of chronic non-communicable diseases and injuries.

Provided by:

E. Ann Davis, DVM MPH MT(ASCP)

Scientific Review Officer

(On Detail from Fogarty International Center)
Population Sciences and Epidemiology (PSE) Integrated Review Group
Center for Scientific Review, NIH
6701 Rockledge Drive, Room 3137, MSC 7770
Bethesda, MD  20892-7770 (20817 for Fed Ex/delivery)
ph:  301-435-1251
fax:  301-480-1056

Email: davisann2@mail.nih.gov

8th Annual Scientific Conference of Chittagong Veterinary and Animal Sciences University (CVASU), Bangladesh.

   Date of Conference: 16-18 March, 2010

The theme of this year’s conference is "Networking for promoting change towards One World One Health".

Please see details on website’s Upcoming Events page http://www.onehealthinitiative.com/events.php

Provided by:

Amam Zonaed Siddiki, PhD
Associate Professor
Dept of Pathology and Parasitology
Chittagong Veterinary and Animal Sciences University
Khulshi, Chittagong-4202
Bangladesh
Tel.  0088 031 659093        (ext 113)
      0088 0171 771 8884    (mobile)
Fax. 0088 031 659620 (lab)

New Year's Resolution: "One Health" Recognition and Implementation without delay. Protect and save human and animal life today and tomorrow!

Florida Department of Health (USA) Director of Environmental Health Division Presented One Health Paper at Doha, Qatar Scientific Program December 16, 2009 (view PowerPoint Slides on Publication page http://www.onehealthinitiative.com/publications.php):

Lisa Conti, DVM, MPH, Director of the Florida Department of Health’s (USA) Environmental Health Division and One Health Newsletter editorial board member, presented a talk entitled “Thé intersection between Human and Animal Health - Zoonotic Diseases” http://www.q-medec.com/brochures/Congress%20Booklet.pdf  Wednesday, December 16 as an invited speaker at the Qatar International Medical Exhibition & Congress 2009 http://www.medical-events.com/congress/q-medec-qatar-international-medical-exhibition-congress-2009 in Doha, Qatar. 

The Qatar Health Conference 2009 http://www.q-medec.com/, the first of its kind for the State of Qatar, was held in the Doha Exhibition Center, December 12-16.  Dr. Conti’s presentation was one of 12 in the "Development and Implementation of Disaster Reduction Strategies in the Middle East" Disaster Track. 

Dr. Conti focused her One Health talk on zoonoses which may be used as bioterrorist agents using slides from both Iowa State University's ‘train the trainer’ preparedness tools as well as colleagues' presentations. She also mentioned toxicological environmental and occupational health issues.  As with most other presenters in this track, the audience did not ask questions or appear to contact the speakers after the talks. The organizers established the objectives of the conference and exhibition to promote awareness of medical research, service, products and equipment and to boost the country's healthcare market.

Dr. Conti, a noted American public health veterinarian, and prominent American public health physician at Yale Medical School, Dr. Peter Rabinowitz, published a groundbreaking ‘first of its kind’ One Health book December 18, 2009 entitled Human-Animal Medicine – Clinical Approaches to Zoonoses and other Shared Health Risks http://www.us.elsevierhealth.com/product.jsp?isbn=9781416068372. 

International Society of Infectious Diseases (IDSD)/ProMED-Mail Wins Chase Community Giving Award – Round 1 ($25,000 Grant) - December 16, 2009

IDSD/ProMED-mail was notified that they have been awarded a $25,000 grant from the ‘Chase Community Giving program – Round 1’ http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/.  This resulted from a vote of Facebook users who recognized the significant contribution and service that IDSD/ProMED-mail has performed by distributing important worldwide infectious disease information in their free e-mail posts online http://www.promedmail.org/pls/otn/f?p=2400:1000.

ProMED-mail monitors emerging diseases and is a program of the International Society for Infectious Diseases.

Beginning January 15, 2010, Facebook users will have the opportunity to cast up to 5 votes for the charities of their choice, but only one vote per charity.  The eligible organization receiving the most votes and meeting program requirements will earn a $1 million grant from Chase.  Five additional charities will each receive a $100,000 grant towards their cause.

The autonomous, pro bono One Health Initiative website, managed by Laura H. Kahn, MD, MPH, MPP, Thomas P. Monath, MD, Jack Woodall, PhD and Bruce Kaplan, DVM, supports and appreciates ProMED-mail (See website http://www.onehealthinitiative.com/promed.php) and ProMED-mail personnel support and appreciate the “One Health” concept.   We urge One Health supporters worldwide to consider voting for ProMED on the Chase Community website http://apps.facebook.com/chasecommunitygiving/ on January 15, 2010.

Thank you!

Florida Department of Health (USA) Director of Environmental Health Division to Present One Health Paper at Doha, Qatar Scientific Program December 16 (this Wednesday):

Lisa Conti, DVM, MPH, Director of the Florida Department of Health’s (USA) Environmental Health Division and One Health Newsletter editorial board member, is scheduled to present a talk entitled “Thé intersection between Human and Animal Health - Zoonotic Diseases” http://www.q-medec.com/brochures/Congress%20Booklet.pdf  this coming Wednesday, December 16 as an invited speaker at the Qatar International Medical Exhibition & Congress 2009 http://www.medical-events.com/congress/q-medec-qatar-international-medical-exhibition-congress-2009 in Doha, Qatar.  

Dr. Conti, a noted American public health veterinarian, and prominent American public health physician at Yale Medical School, Dr. Peter Rabinowitz, expect to publish a groundbreaking ‘first of its kind’ One Health book this month (December 2009) entitled Human-Animal Medicine – Clinical Approaches to Zoonoses and other Shared Health Risks http://www.us.elsevierhealth.com/product.jsp?isbn=9781416068372. 

One Health Workshop—‘First of its kind’ in City University, Hong Kong

December 10, 2009

 December 9, 2009

 Dear One Health Initiative,

 I would like to draw your attention to the One Health Workshop being 

 conducted in City University, Hong Kong on 10 December 2009. This is

 the first initiative of its kind in Hong Kong.

 Please refer to the website:

 http://www6.cityu.edu.hk/onehealth/speech_04.html]

  http://www6.cityu.edu.hk/onehealth/speech_04.html

  Howard Wong, M.A., Vet.MB, MPVM, MRCVS

  Senior Veterinarian

  Hong Kong Zoological and Botanical Gardens

  Hong Kong

December 3, 2009

International Society for Disease Surveillance – 2009 Eight Annual Conference

http://www.syndromic.org/  and http://www.syndromic.org/conference/2009/agenda.pdf

In 2005 the International Society for Disease Surveillance was launched.

Mission Statement
The mission of the International Society for Disease Surveillance is to improve population health by advancing the field of disease surveillance. In support of this mission, the Society provides an educational and scientific forum where epidemiologists, informaticists, public health practitioners, health care providers, statisticians, and others can work together to explore and address population health monitoring across institutional and professional boundaries.

Institute of Medicine - One Health Study Potential Highly Significant:

For National and Global One Health Implementation and Institutionalization

Prepared by Laura H. Kahn, MD, MPH, MPP, Bruce Kaplan, DVM, Thomas P. Monath, MD and Jack Woodall, PhD - November 30, 2009

   One Health Initiative http://www.onehealthinitiative.com Website Team

The National Academy of Sciences’  Board on Global Health of the Institute of Medicine (IOM) and the Institute for Laboratory Animal Research of the National Research Council (NRC) have announced their intention to conduct  a study of the One Health Initiative in early 2010 pending acquiring needed funding estimated at approximately $1.3 million.  On November 17, 2009, the newly formed One Health Commission (OHC), a national U.S. incorporated, non-profit organization of supportive entities—including the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA), and the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA), and others—provided a ‘summit’ meeting where the IOM announced its intent to conduct a study that will evaluate the efficacy of implementing and institutionalizing the One Health concept in the United States and hopefully worldwide.

According to the OHC press release, “the Institute of Medicine study will examine the interdependencies of human, animal and ecosystem health and assess the potential value to be gained through a collaborative approach towards improved health worldwide. The results of the study will be utilized to develop a strategic roadmap for public and private policies and initiatives that will be instrumental in shaping the implementation of the One Health vision [concept].”

The Institute of Medicine http://www.iom.edu/en/About-IOM.aspx is an independent, nonprofit organization that works outside of government to provide unbiased and authoritative advice to decision makers and the public.

The IOM is the health arm of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) and was established in 1970.   NAS was chartered under President Abraham Lincoln in 1863. Nearly 150 years later, the NAS expanded into what is collectively known as the National Academies, now comprises the National Academy of Sciences, the National Academy of Engineering, the National Research Council, and the IOM.

The mission of IOM is to serve as adviser to the nation to improve health. The IOM asks and answers the nation’s most pressing questions about health and health care.  Its goal is to help those in government and the private sector make informed health decisions by providing evidence upon which they can rely. Each year, more than 2,000 individuals, members, and nonmembers volunteer their time, knowledge, and expertise to advance the nation’s health through the work of the IOM.

Many of the studies that the IOM undertakes begin as specific mandates from Congress; still others are requested by federal agencies and independent organizations.  Expert, consensus committees are vital to the IOM advisory role.  They also convene a series of forums, roundtables, and standing committees, as well as other activities, to facilitate discussion, discovery, and critical, cross-disciplinary thinking.

Harvey V. Fineberg, MD, PhD, is President of the Institute of Medicine (IOM). He served as Provost of Harvard University from 1997 to 2001, following thirteen years as Dean of the Harvard School of Public Health. He has devoted most of his academic career to the fields of health policy and medical decision making. His past research has focused on the process of policy development and implementation, assessment of medical technology, evaluation and use of vaccines, and dissemination of medical innovations.

Dr. Fineberg helped found and served as president of the Society for Medical Decision Making and also served as consultant to the World Health Organization. At the Institute of Medicine, he has chaired and served on a number of panels dealing with health policy issues, ranging from AIDS to new medical technology. He also served as a member of the Public Health Council of Massachusetts (1976-1979), as chairman of the Health Care Technology Study Section of the National Center for Health Services Research (1982-1985), and as president of the Association of Schools of Public Health (1995-1996).

Dr. Fineberg is co-author of the books Clinical Decision Analysis, Innovators in Physician Education, and The Swine Flu Affair, an analysis of the controversial federal immunization program against swine flu in 1976. He has co-edited several books on such diverse topics as AIDS prevention, vaccine safety, and understanding risk in society. He has also authored numerous articles published in professional journals. Dr. Fineberg is the recipient of several honorary degrees and the Joseph W. Mountin Prize from the U.S. Centers for Disease Control. He earned his bachelor's and doctoral degrees from Harvard University.

Patrick Kelley, MD, DrPH, joined the IOM in July 2003 as Director Board on Global Health and was later appointed the Director of the Board of African Science Academy Development.  Dr. Kelly has published 60 scholarly papers, monographs, book chapters.

Dr. Kelley served in the U.S. Army for more than 23 years as a physician, residency director, epidemiologist, and program manager. In his last position with the Department of Defense, he founded and directed the presidentially-mandated Department of Defense Global Emerging Infections Surveillance and Response System.

In this role, he managed approximately $42 million dollars of emerging infections surveillance, response, training, and capacity-building activities in partnership with numerous elements of the federal government and with health ministries in over 45 developing countries.

Dr. Kelley obtained his MD from the University of Virginia and his DrPH from the Johns Hopkins School of Hygiene and Public Health.

The IOM's Board on Global Health is concerned with advancing the health of populations worldwide. This involves addressing developing country health issues, enhancing the United States role in global health, and addressing health issues that have implications for U.S. health policy. In 2009, the IOM's Board is scheduled to release a report that will press for a deeper commitment to global health by the U.S. and communicate specific conclusions and recommendations that would pertain to not only the government, but also to the private sector, academia, the public health and scientific research communities, the diplomatic and national security communities, foundations, and the media.

The National Research Council (NRC) http://sites.nationalacademies.org/NRC/index.htm  functions under the auspices of the National Academy of Sciences (NAS), the National Academy of Engineering (NAE), and the Institute of Medicine (IOM). The NAS, NAE, IOM, and NRC are part of a private, nonprofit institution that provides science, technology and health policy advice under a congressional charter signed by President Abraham Lincoln that was originally granted to the NAS in 1863. Under this charter, the NRC was established in 1916, the NAE in 1964, and the IOM in 1970. The four organizations are collectively referred to as the National Academies.

The mission of the NRC is to improve government decision making and public policy, increase public education and understanding, and promote the acquisition and dissemination of knowledge in matters involving science, engineering, technology, and health. The institution takes this charge seriously and works to inform policies and actions that have the power to improve the lives of people in the U.S. and around the world.

The NRC is committed to providing elected leaders, policy makers, and the public with expert advice based on sound scientific evidence. The NRC does not receive direct federal appropriations for its work. Individual projects are funded by federal agencies, foundations, other governmental and private sources, and the institution’s endowment. The work is made possible by 6,000 of the world’s top scientists, engineers, and other professionals who volunteer their time without compensation to serve on committees and participate in activities.  The NRC is administered jointly by the NAS, NAE, and the IOM through the NRC Governing Board.

The core services involve collecting, analyzing, and sharing information and knowledge. The independence of the institution, combined with its unique ability to convene experts, allows it to be responsive to a host of requests.

The Institute for Laboratory Animal Research (ILAR) http://www.national-academies.org/ilar, founded in 1952, is a component of the National Research Council's Division on Earth and Life Studies. It serves as a coordinating agency and a national and international resource for compiling and disseminating information on laboratory animals, promoting education, planning and conducting conferences and symposia, surveying existing and required facilities and resources, upgrading laboratory animal resources, and promoting high-quality, humane care of laboratory animals. ILAR is guided by a 15-member Council, made up of experts in laboratory animal medicine, zoology, genetics, and related biomedical sciences.

The Kahn-Kaplan-Monath-Woodall One Health team strongly supports and endorses prospects for an IOM-NRC “One Health” study.

NEW Online Food Safety Course Offered by Institute of Food Technologists

The Institute of Food Technologists is offering a new online food safety course to help participants learn more about incorporating food safety throughout the entire product development process. Explore the key issues concerning food safety, identify food safety hazards and control measures, and deepen their understanding about HACCP considerations, quality management systems, and other food safety practices.
 
This course that will help you to identify food safety issues within the product development process, discover ways to apply sound science in key aspects of product development, understand food safety regulations throughout the product development process, learn to apply lessons learned from past food safety issues and cases, and recognize the importance of consumer concerns about food safety. More information about this course can be found at: www.ift.org/learnonline.

 From National Meat Association’s Weekly Newsletter – ‘Lean Trimmings and Herd On The Hill’  November 23, 2009 http://nmaonline.org/index.php

*Happy Thanksgiving to ALL from One Health Initiative website’s One Health team!

One Health Supporter Stephen S. Morse Named Director of USAID Early Warning Project

Initiative will monitor diseases that move between animals and people to prevent next pandemic

http://www.mailman.columbia.edu/news/stephen-s-morse-named-director-usaid-early-warning-project

November 9, 2009 -- A new project -- PREDICT -- has been created with up to $75 million in funds over five years from the U.S. Agency for International Development’s (USAID) Emerging Pandemic Threats Program to develop a global warning system for newly emerging diseases and to anticipate and prevent emerging infectious diseases that move between animals and people in order to prevent the next global pandemic. Stephen S. Morse, Ph.D., professor of clinical Epidemiology and former director of the Center for Public Health Preparedness at the Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health, was named director of the PREDICT program.

PREDICT is being funded by USAID to help prepare the world for infectious diseases like H1N1 flu, avian flu, SARS and Ebola. The program is a major component of USAID’s overall Emerging Pandemic Threats (EPT) program, which builds on the successes of USAID’s long-standing efforts in developing global health capacity and disease surveillance, training, and outbreak response, particularly those addressing avian and pandemic influenza.

The PREDICT program that Dr. Morse will direct includes a consortium of organizations led by the School of Veterinary Medicine of the University of California Davis. The other organizations in the PREDICT consortium include the Wildlife Conservation Society, Wildlife Trust, Global Viral Forecasting, Inc., and the Smithsonian Institution. The concept of ‘One Health’ -- that human, animal, and environmental health are inextricably linked and should be considered holistically -- is a core principle of the PREDICT effort.

The current H1N1 influenza pandemic, which is thought to have originated in swine, is a reminder that controlling pandemics and other emerging infections requires understanding of their origins and ecology in nature. “Historically, pandemics occurred perhaps every 30 to 40 years,” noted Dr. Morse. “But in our modern world, the chances of novel diseases or even a new pandemic emerging are greater than ever because of how we live and the extent to which we travel. Our human settlements and roadways push deeper into forests and wild areas where we now raise livestock and poultry; and we transport ourselves, our animals, and our food farther and faster around the globe.”

“Predicting where new diseases may emerge from wild animals and detecting viruses and other pathogens before they spread among people give us the best chance to prevent new pandemics,” said scientist Jonna Mazet, who is leading the PREDICT project at UC Davis and the director of UC Davis’ new One Health Institute in the School of Veterinary Medicine.

The PREDICT team will be active in global hotspots where important wildlife host species have significant interaction with domestic animals and high-density human populations. They include South America's Amazon Basin, Africa’s Congo Basin and neighboring Rift Valley, South Asia's Gangetic Plain, and Southeast Asia. Those conditions enable the spread of microbes, especially viruses and bacteria, from animals to humans.

Among the 1,461 pathogens recognized to cause diseases in humans, at least 60 percent are of animal origin. Notable outbreaks of these animal-to-human diseases, or zoonoses, include:

• The 1918 influenza pandemic, which was probably caused by a virus that jumped from birds, killed over 50 million people globally;
• The human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which moved from chimpanzees to people, and now infects more than 33 million individuals;
• Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS), which emerged in 2003 from southern China "wet markets" where live wild animals are sold for food; and
• The recent outbreaks of avian influenza H5N1, or "bird flu," as well as the current H1N1 influenza pandemic.

Dr. Stephen S. Morse previously served as program manager for Biodefense at the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), Department of Defense, where he co-directed the Pathogen Countermeasures program, and in the laboratory as a professor in virology at The Rockefeller University. Dr. Morse originated the term and concept of emerging viruses/infections; and currently serves on the Steering Committee of the Institute of Medicine's Forum on Microbial Threats, and served on the original National Academy of Sciences' Committee on Emerging Microbial Threats to Health (and chaired its Task Force on Viruses). He was the founding chair of ProMED (the nonprofit international Program to Monitor Emerging Diseases) and an originator of ProMED-mail, an international network inaugurated by ProMED in 1994 for outbreak reporting and disease monitoring using the Internet. Most recently, he has been working on predictive models for influenza and the 1918 pandemic. His book, Emerging Viruses (Oxford University Press) was selected by "American Scientist" for its list of "100 Top Science Books of the 20th Century.

About the Mailman School of Public Health
The only accredited school of public health in New York City and among the first in the nation, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health pursues an agenda of research, education, and service to address the critical and complex public health issues affecting millions of people locally and globally. The Mailman School is the recipient of some of the largest government and private grants in Columbia University’s history. Its more than 1000 graduate students pursue master’s and doctoral degrees, and the School’s 300 multi-disciplinary faculty members work in more than 100 countries around the world, addressing such issues as infectious and chronic diseases, health promotion and disease prevention, environmental health, maternal and child health, health over the life course, health policy, and public health preparedness. More information: http://www.mailman.columbia.edu

About the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine
As a top veterinary school internationally, and the leading one in preventive medicine and wildlife health, UC Davis has an extensive research and training track record in the fields of epidemiology, surveillance, zoonotic diseases, comparative medicine, diagnostics, wildlife pathogens and conservation, food safety, disease prevention, and outbreak response. The school has trained more than 800 international veterinarians from 75 countries, including hotspots in Africa, Latin America, and Asia. Its One Health Institute and Wildlife Health Center manage One Health programs for people and animals ranging from the Pacific Northwest to Africa's Congo Basin and Rift Valley. More information: http://www.vetmed.ucdavis.edu/ohi/predict/index.cfm

About USAID
USAID is the lead U.S. Government Agency providing foreign development and humanitarian assistance. The agency's Global Development Alliance (GDA) links U.S. foreign assistance with the resources, expertise and creativity of the private sector as well as nongovernmental organizations. Since its launch in 2001, the Global Development Alliance has changed the way many U.S. international development projects are financed and implemented. USAID has cultivated more than 900 public-private alliances with over 1,700 individual partners to benefit development programming. More information: http://www.usaid.gov.

Historic FIRST Joint One Health Symposium with the American Society of Tropical Medicine and Hygiene (ASTMH) and the Society of Veterinary Tropical Medicine (SVTM) will be held Nov 21, 2009 at 3:45 p.m.

ASTMH 58th Annual Meeting
November 18-22, 2009
Washington, DC, USA
Contact: info@astmh.org
www.astmh.org

The agenda:

TITLE: One World - One Health and Intercontinental Invaders

First Joint Symposium of the American Society of Tropical Medicine & Hygiene and the Society of Veterinary Tropical Medicine

Bob H. Bokma, E. Paul Gibbs, Thomas P. Monath, Co-Chairs

“ONE HEALTH" APPROACH TO INVESTIGATE ZOONOTIC WATERBORNE PROTOZOAL PARASITES IN CALIFORNIA AND TANZANIA - Patricia A. Conrad, Woutrina Miller, Deana Clifford, and Jonna K. Mazet

RIFT VALLEY FEVER VIRUS, A ZOONOTIC DISEASE OF HIGH CONSEQUENCE IN BOTH THE VETERINARY AND HUMAN HEALTH ARENAS – T.G. Ksiazek

MARINE VERTEBRATES AS SENTINELS OF EMERGING INFECTIOUS DISEASES: ONE HEALTH LINKING LAND TO SEA - A. Alonso Aguirre

HOW WEST NILE AND AVIAN INFLUENZA VIRUSES ILLUSTRATE THE CHALLENGES IN APPLYING ONE HEALTH - Samantha E. J. Gibbs

CONCURRENT DEVELOPMENT OF NOVEL WEST NILE VACCINES FOR HUMANS AND EQUIDS: APPLICATION OF ONE HEALTH PRINCIPLES - Thomas P. Monath

Newly Formed One Health Commission Holds Groundbreaking Summit at National Academy of Sciences on One Health: Improving Health in an Interconnected World

Institute of Medicine announces study on One Health

WASHINGTON, Nov. 17 /PRNewswire/ -- The newly formed One Health Commission, in partnership with the Institute of Medicine and National Research Council, today held a groundbreaking summit at the National Academy of Sciences convening leading health science experts across the human, animal and ecosystem disciplines. The One Health Commission Summit aimed to raise awareness of the importance of transcending institutional and disciplinary boundaries to improve health outcomes for all species. During the Summit, the Institute of Medicine formally announced its intent to conduct a study that will shape the One Health vision.

Doug O'Brien, J.D., Senior Advisor to the Secretary of the U.S. Department of Agriculture, delivered the keynote address, calling for integrated solutions and collaborative leadership to address the significant challenges of a changing environment populated by interconnected animal, human and ecosystem interactions.

"As we combat global pandemics, such as H1N1 influenza, it is imperative that health science professions, academia, government agencies and non-governmental organizations act in unison across the human, animal and ecosystem sciences," said Mr. O'Brien.

Leading experts from such disparate organizations as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Food and Drug Administration, Minnesota Department of Natural Resources and College of Veterinary Medicine at The Ohio State University also expressed the critical need for a One Health approach through the purview of their diverse fields.

The Institute of Medicine study will examine the interdependencies of human, animal and ecosystem health and assess the potential value to be gained through a collaborative approach towards improved health worldwide. The results of the study will be utilized to develop a strategic roadmap for public and private policies and initiatives that will be instrumental in shaping the implementation of the One Health vision. The Institute of Medicine study is scheduled to launch in early 2010, pending the acquirement of sufficient funding.

Dr. Roger Mahr, DVM, Chief Executive Officer of the One Health Commission, indicated, "The Institute of Medicine study will afford the opportunity to develop an evidence-based rationale for One Health and offer recommendations to guide the implementation of One Health, both domestically and internationally."

An audio webcast of the event is available at www.national-academies.org. A comprehensive agenda and additional information about the One Health Commission Summit can be accessed at www.onehealthcommission.org.

The One Health Commission Summit set the stage for the work of the Commission, which was created to establish closer professional collaborations and educational opportunities across the health science professions and their related disciplines. By bringing together policy makers and leaders from the private, public and academic sectors, the One Health Commission hopes to develop and sustain an integrated strategy for improved public health based on the principles of One Health. The Commission's goals also include raising awareness of the value of One Health and developing an interdisciplinary research agenda for the One Health movement.

About the One Health Commission

The One Health Commission represents a call for greater cooperation across multiple disciplines at the local, national and global level to achieve optimal health for people, domestic animals, wildlife and the environment. The Commission incorporated as a nonprofit organization on June 29, 2009. Initial funding for the creation of the One Health Commission includes a grant provided by The Rockefeller Foundation. For more information, visit www.onehealthcommission.org.

SOURCE One Health Commission

 http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/newly-formed-one-health-commission-holds-groundbreaking-summit-at-national-academy-of-sciences-on-one-health-improving-health-in-an-interconnected-world-70291322.html

U vet school gets $55M to study deadly pandemics

The University of Minnesota's School of Veterinary Medicine has been awarded a $55 million federal grant, one of the largest in the university's history, to help stop future pandemic diseases around the globe….

By JOSEPHINE MARCOTTY, Star Tribune

Last update: October 30, 2009 - 10:39 PM

SEE full article: http://www.startribune.com/lifestyle/health/67833552.html?page=1&c=y

VetsWEB.com

http://www.vetsweb.com/news/iceland-h1n1-outbreak-in-pigs-possibly-from-staff-587.html

Iceland: H1N1 outbreak in pigs possibly from staff

//29 Oct 2009

The ag authorities of Iceland reported ten cases of pandemic influenza H1N1 on a farm of 4500 pigs.

Clinical signs started with 10 sows off feed, temperature >40°C, some were coughing and two aborted.

Two workers had had flu-like symptoms for a few days prior to the clinical signs in the pigs, which makes it possible that the H1N1 influenza was transmitted from them to the pigs.

Source: OIE

“ONE HEALTH in Action”!

      ---ProMED-Mail---

Early on, editor Dr. Larry Madoff, several of the associate editors and other participants of ProMED-mail (see listed below) expressed strong support for the One Health concept to the One Health team founders of the One Health Intiative website.  Their important global action contributions have been and are a significant example of “One Health”! 

“ProMED-mail - the Program for Monitoring Emerging Diseases - is an Internet-based reporting system dedicated to rapid global dissemination of information on outbreaks of infectious diseases and acute exposures to toxins that affect human health, including those in animals and in plants grown for food or animal feed. Electronic communications enable ProMED-mail to provide up-to-date and reliable news about threats to human, animal, and food plant health around the world, seven days a week.

By providing early warning of outbreaks of emerging and re-emerging diseases, public health precautions at all levels can be taken in a timely manner to prevent epidemic transmission and to save lives.

ProMED-mail is open to all sources and free of political constraints. Sources of information include media reports, official reports, online summaries, local observers, and others. Reports are often contributed by ProMED-mail subscribers. A team of expert human, plant, and animal disease moderators screen, review, and investigate reports before posting to the network. Reports are distributed by email to direct subscribers and posted immediately on the ProMED-mail web site. ProMED-mail currently reaches over 40,000 subscribers in at least 185 countries.

A central purpose of ProMED-mail is to promote communication amongst the international infectious disease community, including scientists, physicians, epidemiologists, public health professionals, and others interested in infectious diseases on a global scale. ProMED-mail encourages subscribers to participate in discussions on infectious disease concerns, to respond to requests for information, and to collaborate together in outbreak investigations and prevention efforts. ProMED-mail also welcomes the participation of interested persons outside of the health and biomedical professions.

ProMED-mail was established in 1994 with the support of the Federation of American Scientists and SatelLife. Since October 1999, ProMED-mail has operated as an official program of the International Society for Infectious Diseases, a nonprofit professional organization with 20,000 members worldwide.

ProMED-mail is also available in Portuguese, ProMED-PORT, and in Spanish, ProMED-ESP. Both of these lists cover disease news and topics relevant to Portuguese- and Spanish-speaking countries in Latin America, respectively. ProMED-RUS offers Russian-language reports relevant to the independent states of the former Soviet Union. PRO/MBDS offers reports in English on countries in Southeast Asia bordering the Mekong river. Under a recent grant from Google.org, ProMED-mail is working to enlarge our networks in West Africa (ProMED-FRA) posted in French, and East Africa (ProMED-EAFR) posted in English.

ProMED-mail and ISID are grateful to Google.org, the Gates Foundation, the Rockefeller Foundation, the Oracle Corporation, the Nuclear Threat Initiative, and many individual donors for financial support. Please consider a donation by clicking on the Donations link on the left.

Web services for ProMED-mail are provided as a public service by the Oracle Corporation. E-mail services are provided by the Harvard School of Public Health.”

Publications and Presentations by ProMED Authors
http://www.isid.org/publications/promed_mail_publications.shtml

ProMED in the News
http://www.isid.org/publications/promed_mail_inthenews.shtml

ONE HEALTH SUPPORTER…

New Zealand Centre for Conservation Medicine (NZCCM) – Auckland

           Officially opened on August 10, 2007

http://www.aucklandzoo.com/Homepage/Explore-The-Zoo/Conservation-Medicine-Centre/

The One Health Initiative website was notified October 16, 2009 that the NZCCM is a One Health supporter.

Provided by:

Richard Jakob-Hoff, BVMS, MACVSc (Wildlife Medicine)

Senior Veterinarian – Conservation & Research

New Zealand Centre For Conservation Medicine

Auckland Zoological Park

Private Bag, Grey Lynn, Auckland

New Zealand

The National Association of State Public Health Veterinarians (NASPHV) http://www.nasphv.org/  helps direct and develop uniform public health procedures involving zoonotic disease in the United States and its territories.

The NASPHV, a longstanding One Health supporter, now offers a link to the One Health Initiative website: http://www.nasphv.org/links.html

Ultrasound Discovery of the 20^th Century – Unheralded as One Health Example

http://www.ob-ultrasound.net/jjwild.html    [1982 Press Release]

John J. Wild, MD (physician) and William Reid, PhD (Electrical Engineer): working as an interdisciplinary team, Drs. Wild and Reid discovered and built the ultrasound instrument used commonly today to diagnose cancer in humans [and animals].

Dr. Wild died September 18, 2009 according to a New York Times (USA) obituary today, October 7, 2009:

http://www.nytimes.com/2009/10/07/health/07wild.html?_r=1&ref=obituaries

_________________________________

Today - a similar 21^st Century One Health Model

The One Health Initiative website has previously reported Orthopedic Surgeons (a veterinarian and physician) Research Creative Hip and Knee Replacements for Dogs and Humans Together - Wednesday, June 03, 2009:  “Veterinarian James "Jimi" Cook, DVM, PhD, a University of Missouri- Columbia college of veterinary medicine professor of orthopedic surgery and physician B. Sonny Bal, MD, JD, MBA, Associate Professor of Orthopedic Surgery college of medicine have collaborated for over seven years on efforts to create hip and knee replacements without using commonplace biomechanical metal and plastic materials.  The technique being developed by Dr. Cook for dogs initially, involves use of laboratory grown tissue (cartilage) that can be molded into replicas of joints that require replacement.  Drs. Bal and Cook are concomitantly developing a process whereby a similar process can be adapted for humans.”

http://www.columbiamissourian.com/stories/2009/06/02/mu-research-may-lead-treatment-lou-gehrigs-disease/

  Florida State Department of Health

                       Environmental Health Press Release – April 13, 2009

News Release

The Alliance for Rabies Control

For Immediate Release                                                  

 Monday, September 28, 2009 

Contact: Peter Costa                                        

00 + 1.919.830.2199

                                                                                                peter.costa@worldrabiesday.org

Rabies is Still Deadliest Disease, Yet Preventable

Manhattan, KS, September 28, 2009 - Rabies is a disease with the highest case fatality rate of any known infectious disease. Rabies exists in every continent except Antarctica. Rabies has no boundaries and continues to spread across previously rabies-free countries (e.g., the recent news about dog rabies invading the tropical island paradise of Bali). Rabies kills humans regardless of their age, nationality, religion or cultural beliefs. In fact, rabies kills one person every ten minutes - more than 55,000 people every year. Sadly, over 50% of these deaths are children under 15 years of age.

Some of the facts about rabies in certain countries include: infected sheep brain vaccine is still used instead of modern vaccines; human rabies victims are sent home to die because it is cheaper to transport a live body than a dead body; and dog bite victims visit local healers where they are given worthless treatments including magic amulets or told to rub chili powder into their wounds as a cure for rabies. In order to address these issues and effectively reach across all continents, countries, religious backgrounds etc, the first World Rabies Day was established in Sept 2007 by a group of rabies experts that established the global foundation: The Alliance for Rabies Control (www.rabiescontrol.net).

Monday, Sept 28^th will mark the third annual World Rabies Day (WRD). 10,000 visitors from over 150 countries come to the website (www.worldrabiesday.org) every month to download

educational messages to distribute in their own countries. For WRD this year, a multitude of events

will be held across the world in countries with opposing beliefs and diverse cultural backgrounds

including: Pakistan, India, Palestine, Israel, China, Taiwan and many more.  In 2007, 74 countries

held a WRD event.  In 2008, country participation increased 15% with 85 countries hosting activities.   

The WRD initiative has engaged all of the major health organizations including the World Health

Organization (WHO), World Animal Health Organization (OIE), U.S. Centers for Disease Control and

Prevention (CDC) in Atlanta, all of the major Veterinary medical associations and many more

partners. World Rabies Day proves that dedicated partners working together to prevent a deadly

disease can ultimately overcome political barriers. Wishing everyone a brilliant and active World Rabies

Day on Monday, September 28^th.

The Alliance for Rabies Control is the world's foremost non-profit organization dedicated to

 raising global awareness towards human rabies prevention, canine rabies elimination and

 wildlife rabies control. The Alliance strives everyday to keep millions of people around the world safe from rabies.

###

Indiana State (USA) Epidemiologist— Public Health Veterinarian and One Health Supporter/Advocate—Accepts Position as Assistant Commissioner for the Public Health & Preparedness Commission

Judith A. Monroe, MD, Physician Health Commissioner of the Indiana State Department of Health  http://www.in.gov/isdh/  Recently Announced New Assistant Commissioner, James F. Howell, DVM, MPH (see below):

,

I am pleased to announce State Epidemiologist James Howell, DVM, has agreed to serve as assistant commissioner for the Public Health & Preparedness Commission, effective today [Since August 2009].

In this role, Dr. Howell will oversee the following areas: the Public Health & Preparedness Commission includes Environmental Public Health, Epidemiology Resource Center, HIV/STD Division, Indiana Lead & Healthy Homes, Immunization, Local Health Department Outreach, Office of Legislative Affairs, Office of Primary Care, Public Health Preparedness & Emergency Response, and Tuberculosis Control.

Over the 13 years he has worked at the Department, Dr. Howell has shown exemplary professionalism and dedication to serving public health.  I am certain he will become an even greater asset to the agency in his new role.

As state epidemiologist, Dr. Howell oversaw the day-to-day operations of Chronic Disease Epidemiology, Data Analysis, Food Protection, Geographic Information Services, Radiation Health, Surveillance and Investigation of Communicable Disease, as well as Zoonotic and Vector-borne Diseases.   In addition to his current position, he has served as Director of Operations, Veterinary Epidemiologist, and as the Surveillance/Investigation Coordinator.

Dr. Howell has had a varied professional career in both private and public sector.  He was a clinical practitioner for more than two years in mixed veterinary practices in north central Pennsylvania.  He also served more than 24 years in the US Air Force in veterinary and public health roles at base level, Dept. of Defense level, and at Air Force Major Command Headquarters.  His last military assignment was at the Air Force Material Command Surgeon’s Office, where he oversaw public health programs at 13 air force bases from Massachusetts to Florida to California and was the command’s senior advisor for officers in the Biomedical Science Corps.

Howell received his Doctor of Veterinary Medicine degree from Purdue University and his Masters in Public Health from the University of Michigan.  He is a Diplomate of the American College of Veterinary Preventive Medicine.  In addition to numerous military decorations and awards, Dr. Howell is a recipient of the Purdue University School of Veterinary Medicine’s Distinguished Alumni Award.

 Judy Monroe, MD 

The National Academy of Science, Institute of Medicine issued a press release on September 22 in support of the recently-issued report entitled "Sustaining Global Surveillance and Response to Emerging Zoonotic Diseases."  This effort was funded by US Agency for International Development [USAID]; Dr. Marguerite Pappaioanou was the co-Chair of the committee. 

See this link for the press release:  http://www8.nationalacademies.org/onpinews/newsitem.aspx?RecordID=12625.  This link will take you to report - to purchase or to read on-line for free:  http://www.nap.edu/catalog.php?record_id=12625.

To access additional information regarding this project such as its charge; previous meeting agendas and presentations; and related reports; see:  http://www.iom.edu/CMS/3783/54653.aspx

Tracy S. DuVernoy, DVM, MPH, DACVPM
Veterinary Medical Officer
Food and Drug Administration
Center for Food Safety and Applied Nutrition
Office of Food Defense, Communication and Emergency Response
Emergency Coordination and Response Team
[FDA CFSAN OFDCER ECRT HFS-015]
5100 Paint Branch Parkway, Room 2B-024
College Park, MD 20740-3835
Phone: 301-436-2248
Cell:  240-401-0788
Fax: 301-436-2633
Email: Tracy.DuVernoy@fda.hhs.gov

One Health Principles in Mongolia

Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia

September 9^th 2009

By Nigel Brown, BVSc, MSc, MACVSc, MRCVS, Zolzaya Baljinnyam, BVM, MIPH , and Enkhtur Byakharjav, BVM, MSc

Please see original submission to One Health Initiative website in full on Publication page…

From:

Dr. Nigel Brown

Long Term Veterinary Expert

EU-Mongolia Animal Health and Livestock Marketing Project

Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Light Industry

Peace Avenue -16a

Bayanzurkh 210349

Ulaanbaatar,

Mongolia

mobile:    +976 9529 1003

e-mail:      nigel@tateam.net; drnigel.brown@gmail.com

skype:     doctornigel

Brucellosis, Anthrax, Rabies and Highly Pathogenic Avian Influenza are four of major zoonoses in Mongolia, a country with a population of nearly three million people and 40 million livestock. Nomadic pastoralism is the mainstay of livestock farming (30% GDP is produced by agriculture, 87% by livestock^[1]) but the extreme climate, 20^oC to -30^oC, poses severe health problems which complicate the epidemiology and control of all diseases.

The EU-Mongolia Animal Health and Livestock Marketing Project has ‘improvement of collaboration between donor projects’ as a core philosophy, aiming to maximise the productivity from all projects through synergy. This precept of the One Health Initiative is now being adopted in Mongolia to control these and other limitations to productivity.

The EU Project and The Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC) Livestock Project, two collaborative ventures within the Ministry of Food, Agriculture and Light Industry, are working together to improve the national strategy for brucellosis control coordinating their efforts with the support of Professor Felix Roth^[2] who will be visiting Mongolia again from Switzerland in September.

^[1] OIE (2007) Performance, Vision and Strategy Report on Mongolia

^[2] Felix Roth, (2003). Human health benefits from livestock vaccination for brucellosis: case study, Bulleting of the World Health Organisation, 81 (12) 867 – 876.

Started: August 25, 2009 (Tuesday)

Announcement:

A “Twitter” account is now available on this One Health Initiative website Home page or you may access it via https://twitter.com/OneHealthNews. 

** Access to this feature has been temperamental.  If so, try again repeatedly 2 to 4 times... and/or later.)

Remembering a Great One Health Physician Giant in History …

Richard Shope, MD

Submitted by:

Russell W. Currier, DVM, MPH, Dipl. ACVPM
Executive Vice President 'Emeritus'
American College of Veterinary Preventive Medicine
1864 NW 151 Court
Des Moines IA 50325-7850
Cell (515) 710-2331; home (515) 987-5541
Email: ruscurrier@yahoo.com

In honor of the late great physician researcher, Dr. Currier presents a list of Dr. Shope’s crucial historical contributions to medical and veterinary medical science.

Summary of Richard Edwin Shope Contributions to One Medicine/Health

Richard E. Shope MD (Dec 25, 1901 – October 2, 1966) was one of the pioneer microbiologists to investigate a variety of human and animal diseases and merits recognition for his many accomplishments that supported later research that continues to this very day.  Dr Shope graduated from medical school at The University of Iowa in 1924 and immediately remained on staff there to teach pharmacology and work on the chemotherapy of tuberculosis.  Shortly afterward he was invited to join the laboratories of the Rockefeller Institute at Princeton to work with Dr Paul Lewis, the discoverer of polio virus.  Subsequently in 1928, he left tuberculosis research to investigate hog cholera in the field where he observed his first outbreak of swine influenza.  Later research on influenza resulted in isolation of the virus from pigs and its co-pathogen Haemophilus influenzae suis, and subsequent research that postulated that the swine virus was related to the human 1918 pandemic virus.

Dr Shope acknowledged the influence of the legendary Dr Theobald Smith, at the Rockefeller Institute, on his own career and observed that Smith “although possessed of great imagination and … uncanny foresight, was a meticulously methodical worker, who abhorred the waste of anything – time, material, or animals.”  This set a pattern for Shope’s career and an informal distillation of his key accomplishments are summarized in the bullet form.

• From Bernard Easterday, 4^th Int’l Symposium on Emerging and Reemerging Pig Diseases, Rome June, 2003:   “It remained for Shope to present the first reliable experimental evidence that influenza is caused by a virus (15).  [Year 1931.]  He demonstrated that he could reproduce swine influenza under strict experimental conditions by inoculating both filtered and unfiltered material from affected pigs into the respiratory tract of normal pigs.  The disease produced by the filtered material was mild (later sometimes referred to as “filtrate disease”) but it could be transmitted repeatedly in this manner.  Subsequently, Shope would describe swine influenza as a “… disease of complex etiology, being caused by infection with the bacterium H. influenzae suis and the swine influenza virus acting in concert.”  Three years after Shope reported the viral nature of SI, Andrewes and Laidlaw (15) would report the viral nature of influenza in human beings. [Ref: Shope, RE 1964 Swine Influenza, In Diseases of Swine 2^nd Ed.  Ed by H.W. Dunne.  P. 109-126.]

Note:  Shope and Christopher Andrewes became very good friends and Shope collaborated with the UK investigators on techniques to isolate virus which they subsequently did utilizing ferrets and Andrewes and co-investigators, Smith and Laidlaw, were later knighted for this accomplishment.

• 1936-1937.  Shope postulated linkage between human and swine influenza.  [Laidlaw also advanced same idea at same time.]

• 1941.  Shope postulated linkage of “masked or occult” viral infection of pigs with swine lung worm and its intermediate host, earth worms.  This was very controversial and was not entirely corroborated.  The issue became a moot point as husbandry of pigs was changing that precluded importance of this postulated cycle.

• From Sir Chrotopher Andrewes biographical memoirs:  “In 1930 Shope’s attention was drawn to “mad itch” [aka pseudorabies], a violent distressing and fatal disease of cattle in the Midwest.  He showed that it was caused by a virus transmissible to rabbits, and that it was endemic among pigs, in which it was comparatively harmless.  Cattle contracted infection through contact with pigs.  He finally proved the identity of cattle ‘mad itch’ with psedudorabies, a disease prevalent in parts of Europe.  Later he studied another disease of pigs – swine pox – and showed that it could be, though it was not necessarily, transmitted through the agency of pig-lice.  He also published evidence that hog cholera virus might persist, as swine flu virus appeared to do, in lungworms.  Ref: Biographical Memoirs vol 50 (1979), p 353-375, © The National Academy of Sciences.

• Shope’s three most outstanding discoveries followed each other in rapid succession:  swine influenza in 1931, the rabbit fibroma in 1932, and rabbit papilloma in 1933.”

• Andrewes again, “The work [masked rabbit papilloma virus studies by Shope] gained a new dimension when it was found that in many tame rabbits the warts progressed and became carcinomatous [sic].  This change, though common in domestic rabbits, was rare in cottontails.  Shope at this time, was busy with many problems, so he generously gave the material to Francis Peyton Rous.  What Rous did with the rabbit cancers during the next thirty years is a matter of history.”  [Peyton Rous received Nobel Prize for Medicine in 1966 for work demonstrating viral etiology of cancer.]

•  Viral etiology of cancer.  Shope described papilloma in jack rabbits and the pathological condition bears his name “Shope papilloma [or fibroma]”, and in urban legend mode affected bunnies were referred to as “jack-a-lopes.”  He prompted a colleague at Rockefeller Institute, Peyton Rous, to extend his inquiries to mammals.  Rous had already demonstrated transmission in chickens but not mammals.

• During WW II, Shope was attached to the US Army and detailed to a joint Canadian-US project on Grosse Isle in St Lawrence River to develop a rinderpest vaccine for cattle.  There was concern of biowarfare and deliberately introduced rinderpest would be a food production catastrophe.  From Andrewes, “Here Shope, with a staff of five other scientists, worked in strict isolation, and in the course of nineteen months produced an effective vaccine by growing and attenuating the virus in hens’ eggs.  This has since been used on a large scale in the field.”

• Shope was then transferred back to the Navy.  He was in first party to set up a lab to study tropical diseases on Guam and on Okinawa after assault began.  Shope was actually fired on.  He found mold from Guam growing on photo of his wife Helen.  He isolated a substance from this mold with in vivo antiviral properties and named it after wife “Helenine”.  Later found to be nucleoprotein that stimulated interferon production.

• Approximately two years after WW II:  Shope developed an effective vaccine to a South American rabbit disease that was deliberately introduced to Great Britain to reduce population and extensive burrowing of rabbits in farm fields.  Inadvertent introduction in France however resulted in decimated rabbit populations and adverse effect on commercial rabbitries.  Shope’s vaccine saved the rabbit industry in France.

• Circa 1950s:  Shope isolated a second benign-tumor virus from deer.  Also isolated the deer “hemorrhagic disease” virus. 

• Later when Rockefeller closed the Princeton branch, Shope decided to leave and go to work for Merck in Rahway NJ.  Subsequently he returned to Rockefeller in Manhattan [rented room during weekdays!]  Later died from abdominal cancer October 2^nd, 1966.  During lifetime had two serious viral diseases, lymphocytic choriomeningitis and eastern equine encephalomyelitis. 

•  Andrewes, “  Shope received many honors.  He was elected to the American Philosophical Society (1944) and the National Academy of Sciences (1940).  He received honorary degrees from the universities of Utrecht, Rutgers, Giessen, Chicago, Pennsylvania, Iowa, and Yale, as well as many prizes and awards including the U.S. Army Legion of Merit and the Albert Lasker award.

•  J of Amer Vet Med Ass’n, Nov 15, 1957.  Editorial Comment entitled “Richard Shope, Benefactor of Animals.”  “On May 8, 1957, the Association of American Physicians awarded the Kober Medal to Dr Richard E Shope, the second time this award has been given to a physician for contributions to the health of domesticated animals.  The previous recipient was Dr. Theobald Smith.” [See Harvard Magazine, July-August 2009]

• Dr Shope acknowledged influence of individuals on his career specifically Theobald Smith, who worked out arthropod transmission of disease and Paul Lewis who discovered/isolated polio virus and died of yellow fever while studying the same disease in South America.

• “Dr Shope then paid tribute to a veterinary practitioner, Dr Fred J. Crow of Iowa City Iowa, “who permitted me to spend … time with him in the field…and who guided me during my initial experience with swine influenza…He got me my first case of swine pox and … of pseudorabies and …served as the connecting link between the practicality of the field and science of the laboratory.”  Ref: JAVMA, Nov 15, 1957, p 486-487.

• The following excerpt is from the Souvenir Book published by the Eastern Iowa Veterinary Association on their 25^th Anniversary (1913-1938).  It was written by Richard E. Shope MD, of the Rockefeller Institute for Medical Research, Department of Animal and Plant Pathology, Princeton, New Jersey.

“In the summer of 1928, I was in Iowa doing blood counts in hog cholera and other swine diseases with the cooperation of a number of veterinarians in eastern Iowa.  During that time I had occasion to go to Ames to see Dr Charles Murray and it was he who first called my attention to the existence of swine influenza.  Returning to eastern Iowa, arrangements were made with Dr Fred Crow for the collection of material from typical cases when the epizootic should appear during the autumn.  Dr Crow telegraphed me on November 13 saying, ‘Plenty of hog flu – come at once.’  I took the first train west, and on arriving in Iowa City found that there was indeed plenty of ‘hog flu.’  Through the friendliness and cooperation of a number of eastern Iowa veterinarians and their clients, many swine autopsies were obtained and material from the best cases was shipped back to Princeton.  At that time, because we had no idea as to how fragile or easily killed the causative agent might be, we packed our infectious material in iced thermos jugs and sent it by air mail from Cedar Rapids.  After several unsuccessful attempts to establish swine influenza in our experimental pigs in Princeton with the various samples sent, one batch finally ‘took.’  This had been obtained by Dr Crow on the Probst Brothers’ farm near Iowa City.  Dr Lewis, my chief, wired me of his success in establishing the disease experimentally and to return to Princeton as soon as possible.”

• Richard and Helen Shope had four children and Richard’s scientific aptitude DNA went into the three sons.  Richard Jr went to Cornell and got a DVM and later PhD in virology at University of Minnesota where I was acquainted with him.  Son 2, Robert became the distinguished arbovirologist at Yale after medical school at Cornell; later moved to Galveston and now deceased.  Son 3, became an academic pediatrician at the University of Michigan.  Daughter attended college in Colorado and married well, and pursued equestrian interests, living happily ever after.

• Finally a quote from Dr Peyton Rous’ on the occasion of conferring The Academy Medal to Richard E. Shope, M.D. at the Annual Meeting of The New York Academy of Medicine, January 7, 1965:  “Dr Shope’s theme throughout his scientific life has been the meaning of animal diseases for mankind, though he would never say so.  Yet not alone from this theme has he drawn his wisdom and his strength.  He knows human nature well.  How does he value his fellow creatures including ourselves?  Much as he does the lower animals – with understanding, indulgence, humor, and love.”  Ref:  Bull NY Acad Med, Vol 41, No 4, April 1965.

Russell Currier, 8/09

Winner Announcement: 2008 Latin America - Caribbean Award

The Alliance for Rabies Control and the Pan American Health Organization (PAHO) are proud to announce the winners of the 2008 World Rabies Day Latin America – Caribbean Award!!!  We received 66 reports from projects in 16 participating countries and 25 abstracts were submitted for consideration for the prizes.  The panel of judges was made up of five people from  a cross-section of countries. 

We are now proud to release the names of the winners who met all the judges’ requirements in the following categories:

Best Local Event

Title: THEATRE WORKSHOP FOR  CHILDREN

Contact name: Marilene F. de Almeida

Contact email: marilene@prefeitura.sp.gov.br

City/area: São Paulo, State of São Paulo; Country: Brazil

Best Regional/Departmental Event

Title: RIO DE JANEIRO AGAINST RABIES

Contact name: Dr. Clayton Gitti

Contact email: cbgitti@yahoo.com.br

City/area: State of Rio de Janeiro; Country: Brazil

Best National/International Event

Title: WORLD RABIES DAY 2008

Contact names: Dr. Fernando Vargas Pino/Dra. Verónica Gutiérrez Cedillo

Contact emails: subzoonosis@gmail.com; rabiareservorio@gmail.com

Country: Mexico

Two special mention certificates were also issued for events in Bolivia and Cuba:

Title: A DAY OF ANTI-RABIES CLASSES; Ciudad de Santa Cruz de la Sierra,Bolivia

Title: WORLD RABIES DAY; Cuidad de La Havana, Municipio La Lisa, Cuba

The Latin America – Caribbean Award is an annual prize given by The Alliance for Rabies Control/PAHO partnership to the three best events associated with World Rabies Day.  All Latin American and Caribbean Nations are eligible to compete.  Winners receive $1000 USD to help prepare the following year’s World Rabies Day activities.

For more information, please contact Phyllis Romijn (phyllisromijn@gmail.com) or Jane Coutts (jc@njuggle.com).

Please also see:  http://www.rabiescontrol.net

New Acting Director Named for National Center for Zoonotic, Vector-Borne, and Enteric Diseases at CDC (USA)

I am pleased to announce that RADM Ali Khan, M.D., M.P.H., will be Acting Director of the National Center for Zoonotic, Vector-Borne, and Enteric Diseases (NCZVED), effective September 1.  Ali will replace Lonnie King, D.V.M., who is leaving to join The Ohio State University.

Ali is currently serving as Deputy Director of NCZVED.  He joined CDC and the United States Public Health Service (USPHS) in 1991 as an Epidemic Intelligence Service officer and over the past decade has responded to many high-profile domestic and international public health emergencies, including the initial public health response to Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.  In October 2007, Ali was promoted to Rear Admiral in the USPHS and Assistant Surgeon General, and became one of the youngest flag officers in the Commissioned Corps.  Ali received his medical degree from Downstate Medical Center in New York and his masters of public health from Emory University’s Rollins School of Public Health.

Please join me in supporting Ali as he serves in this key position.  
 

                Thomas R. Frieden, M.D., M.P.H., Director, CDC, and
                                        Administrator, ATSDR

NEW One Health Network website (Belgium)  www.onehealthnet.be

“Why?

Because...

Human welfare and health relies much on animal health…
Animals and human beings share a great number of pathogens…
Human and veterinary medicine use the same molecules and face similar drug resistance problems…
Animal health and epidemiology help understand better public health and epidemiology…
The world has become a global village... 

The objective of this "One Health" network is to strengthen the link between the medical and the veterinary sectors for improved impact assessment, surveillance and control of neglected or emerging zoonoses in developing countries…

The aim of this website is to instigate discussion between researchers and decision makers from the medical and veterinary professions on “One Health” issues. Visit our page to learn about the proposed themes of discussions and submit your own views on the subjects. Short literature reviews (1 or 2 pages) on any issue related to the “One Health” concept are welcome for publication on the web site after peer-review.”

Provided by:

Tanguy Marcotty, DVM, PhD

Department of Animal Health

Institute of Tropical Medicine

Nationalestraat 155

B 2000 Antwerp, Belgium

Fax: +32.3.247.62.68

Phone:

  Office:                +32.3.247.62.63

  Teleworking:           +32.86.40.17.03

  Cellular:              +32.472.85.53.96

New National (USA): "One Health Commission" website launched…

Please see:

http://www.onehealthcommission.org/

CONTACT

Roger K. Mahr, DVM
One Health Project Director

Phone: 630-222-8877

Fax: 630-377-8336

Email: rkmahr@onehealthcommission.org

July 30, 2009

One Health Giant and Great Leader to Leave the Centers for Disease Control (CDC)

-         Lonnie King, DVM, MS, MPA to become Dean at the Ohio State University, College of Veterinary Medicine

The One Health Initiative website learned today that Dr. Lonnie King, Director of the National Center for Zoonotic, Vector-Borne, and Enteric Diseases will leave his position at CDC to become Dean of the College of Veterinary Medicine at the Ohio State University.

The One Health team of Kahn-Kaplan-Monath-Woodall extends our congratulations and best wishes to Dr. King for a successful transition. 

______________________________________________________________

From:   Thomas R. Frieden (CDC)

Sent:   Thursday, July 30, 2009 10:31 AM

To:     CDC All - CDC & ATSDR and non-CDC & non-ATSDR

Subject:        Dr. Lonnie King to Join The Ohio State University

Regretfully, I share news that Dr. Lonnie King will be leaving CDC/ATSDR.

Lonnie King, D.V.M., will join The Ohio State University College as Dean of Veterinary Medicine.  Lonnie currently is Director of the National Center for Zoonotic, Vector-Borne, and Enteric Diseases (NCZVED).  This move will be effective September 1.  I will work with Lonnie to identify and transition an acting director.

As a veterinarian, Lonnie was well placed as the leader of a center that, among its chief responsibilities, monitors and addresses the link between humans, animals, and the environment. NCZVED was established in 2007; Lonnie served as its first director.  In its two-year life, the center has investigated and helped to stop many foodborne disease outbreaks and heightened attention to food safety around the world.

Please join me in wishing Lonnie the best in his upcoming work.

                                    Thomas R. Frieden, M.D., M.P.H.

                                                Director, CDC, and

                                                Administrator, ATSDR

July 30, 2009

Breaking News: World Rabies Day Challenge to Climb Mt Snowdon!!!

Raising Funds for World Rabies Alliance

Dear Friends and Colleagues:

The Alliance has just received word that two groups within the Veterinary Laboratories Agency in Weybridge U.K. have thrown down the gauntlet , as it were, in an exciting challenge to climb Mt Snowdon in observance of World Rabies Day 2009 (www.worldrabiesday.org).

In case you did not know it, Mt Snowdon (located in Wales) is where Sir Edmund Hillary trained for his historic climb to the top of Mount Everest. The Alliance has information that two teams are going to attempt to retrace Sir Hillary’s tracks (on Mt Snowdon not Mt Everest) to raise money to support the global rabies prevention efforts of the Alliance.

We have also heard one of the teams is being led by Dr Tony Fooks (http://www.justgiving.com/mad-scientists-up-a-hill) while the other team seems to be made up of a mysterious group of “very physically fit” challengers (http://www.justgiving.com/snowdonforrabies) that hope to raise more money and beat Dr Fooks and his team to the summit!

We urge you to go to join the fun and donate to your favorite team!  We will be following the progress of both teams and the winners will be announced in our Newsletter as well as at the upcoming Rabies in the Americas meeting!

Sincerely,

The World Rabies Day Team

Vermont (USA) Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics Resolution Endorses One Health

July 2, 2009 – Provided to One Health Initiative website by:

                                        John Trumper, MD

                                        P.O. Box 7, Brattleboro

                                        Vermont 05302

Passed July 1, 2009 - RESOLVED:     That the Vermont Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics continue its programs, already begun, of furthering communication with Veterinarians by endorsing the efforts of the One Health Initiative, which operates globally and nationally, and by working locally with Veterinarians to share presentations of interest to both professions at meetings, websites, and by encouraging individual contact.

Vermont (USA) Pediatrician Describes Activist One Health Collaborative Educational Efforts

June 26, 2009

John Trumper, MD, a retired Vermont pediatrician, updated the One Health Initiative website regarding physician efforts to expand and utilize One Health principles by educating fellow practicing physicians and veterinarians statewide.  This hopefully represents a significant and efficacious blueprint [in brief] to help guide others in the U.S. and abroad.

“The joint meeting and visit (please see News item to follow) from Joan Hendricks, VMD, PhD (Dean of the University of Pennsylvania’s School of Veterinary Medicine) was simply an inauguration of our Vermont efforts to alert practicing physicians in the state to the One Health concept, of which the Veterinarians are already well aware. We have begun with the pediatricians, as we believe that our specialty has the most in common with veterinarians
     Taking seriously your statements about the priority for the development of the OHI concept among practicing primary care physicians and veterinarians, we have a committee from both disciplines working on presentations by veterinarians at community hospital medical staff meetings and Continuing Medical Education sessions. This seems to be the most effective way to reach the silent majority of busy practitioners who don't attend state and national meetings. Our goal is to have local veterinarians do these talks to encourage future relationships between our disciplines at the community level. Our thinking is that offering an outline and/or power-point to the presenter would encourage more DVMs and/or VMDs to do it.
     I attended the Vermont Veterinary Medical Association meeting last week (the lone physician there).  I found it to be very interesting & informative and hope that we can include subjects of mutual interest in future state meetings of both groups. The annual meeting of the Vermont Medical Society in October will also include a short introduction of the One Health concept by a local veterinarian.
     So these are the steps we've taken and are planning; all aimed at our practitioners.”

John Trumper, MD, P.O. Box 7, Brattleboro, Vermont 05302

Footnote: Dr. Trumper has continued numerous activist participations in worthwhile causes related to health care including the One Health movement.

________________________________________

Vermont Physicians and Veterinarians Talk ‘One Health’ while attending Joint Spring Meeting

The Vermont Chapter of the American Academy of Pediatrics and the Vermont Chapter of the American Academy of Family Physicians invited Vermont Veterinary Medical Association members to attend their joint spring meeting in Rutland, VT on April 30, 2009. 

Joan Hendricks, VMD, PhD, Dean of the University of Pennsylvania’s school of veterinary medicine was invited to give the keynote presentation on the One Health Initiative from the veterinary medical perspective. In addition, Dr. Hendricks had been invited to present her description of the One Health concept at Pediatric Grand Rounds to students, residents, and staff at the University of Vermont medical school the day before.  Drs. Hendricks, Charles D. Newton, DVM, MS and Arthur Ribenstein, MBBCh (MD) recently published a comprehensive article in the Veterinaria Italiana One Health monograph entitled ‘One Medicine-One Health’ at the School of Veterinary Medicine of the University of Pennsylvania – the first 125 years http://www.izs.it/vet_italiana/2009/45_1/183.htm.

The University of Pennsylvania’s school of veterinary medicine was started 125 years ago by the physician faculty of their medical school. In 1807 Benjamin Rush, MD postulated that "By extending our knowledge of the causes of the diseases of domestic animals, we may add greatly to the certainty and usefulness of the profession of medicine, as far as it relates to the human species".  From 1884 until the 1960's, students at Penn studying human and animal medicine took the basic science courses (e.g., physiology, pathology, microbiology, etc.) together…further evidence that One Health really does have a long and rich history at Penn.

Dr Hendricks discussed One Health in the context of how the veterinary and human medical professionals collaborate in biomedical research, food safety, environmental health issues, and emergency medical response for the benefit of both human and animal health.  The Human-Animal Bond phenomenon was mentioned using companion animals (pets) and horses in therapy, learning, and helping "at risk" humans at every level.  The use of household pets as sentinels for domestic abuse and prognostication of that possibility in the future was discussed.

A bright future was painted for One Health: developing closer "in the trenches" communication between local physicians/veterinarians/nurses and other health care personnel; increasing numbers of physicians, veterinarians and nurses adding a PhD to their resume;  encouraging state boards to recognize continuing education credits when licensees attend courses advanced by either medical or veterinary medical organizations.

Joann M. Lindenmayer, DVM, MPH, an associate professor in the Department of Environmental and Population Health at Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine and a prominent One Health supporter, presented a short synopsis of Tufts innovative programs involving human and animal medicine. Tufts veterinary medical program was founded 30 years ago on "One Health" principles promoted by University President Jean Mayer, a human nutritionist. Early on, Tufts veterinary medical students attended pre-clinical classes side-by-side with Tufts medical students. Dr. Lindenmayer joined Dr. Hendricks for an informative question, answer and comment session.

Provided by:

J. Clyde Johnson, VMD, Past President,

American Association of Equine Practitioners (AAEP)

313 N. Shore Rd.

Spofford, NH  03462-3907

July 4, 2009

Important!

Request for Information on Veterinary Vaccine Utilization in Sub-Saharan Africa

By Thomas P. Monath, MD

We need help from the veterinary community in solving a critical problem for human vaccines. This is a major opportunity for One Health.

A novel vaccine for protection of infants against malaria, the greatest killer in Africa, is in clinical development by a U.S. biotechnology company, Sanaria Inc. and is supported by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation. This new vaccine is composed of attenuated malaria parasites (sporozoites) and requires storage at ultra low temperature (in vaporized liquid nitrogen). 

If the new vaccine meets expectations and provides high-grade protection against malaria it could save millions of lives. However, the method of storage and distribution represent a challenge. Current childhood vaccines delivered to infants in Africa require a cold chain (using mechanical freezers and refrigerators).. A significant change to the cold chain system to accommodate vapor-phase liquid nitrogen would be required to implement the new malaria vaccine in the Expanded Program of Immunization (EPI).

On the other hand, some veterinary vaccines are distributed in this way in Africa. We are seeking detailed information from our veterinary colleagues on their experience in storing, transporting and delivering vaccines for livestock and poultry in Africa utilizing vapor-phase liquid nitrogen. This experience could inform the medical community on the potential distribution of the attenuated sporozoite vaccine.

Information that would be useful includes:

1) Which vaccines are distributed in vapor-phase liquid N2

2) Level of organization of vaccine distribution within countries and standardization of methods across Africa

3) Availability of liquid N2 and transport boxes

4) Anecdotal information and specific studies on the economics and practicality of vapor-phase liquid N2

5) Comparative advantages and disadvantages of liquid N2 over other methods.

6) If veterinary vaccines are so unstable as to require liquid N2 storage, what are the requirements for use after thawing these products?

 ­­­­­­­­­­­­­­­______________________________________

 Please address comments as soon as possible to:

 Bruce Kaplan, DVM

bkapdvm@verizon.net

Thank you…

Date: July 13, 2009

Location: NICARAGUA - Robin Hughes, DVM Reports

For more please see:

  http://www.rabiescontrol.net/EN/Programs/Projects-Overview/USNS_Comfort.html

Date: July 5. 2009

Location: NICARAGUA 

As reported June 15, 2009 by Robin Hughes, DVM:

 

…”The Surgeon General of the United States made a brief visit to the ship to learn about Operation Continuing Promise and visited us at our work site.” 

 

For more please see:

 

http://www.rabiescontrol.net/EN/Programs/Projects-Overview/USNS_Comfort.html

Date: June 26. 2009

Location: EL SALVADORE

The mission in El Salvador is much the same as in previous countries, that is, vaccinating and deworming cattle. We also vaccinate other animals as the people bring them to us. One observation of interest in this country, as compared to the other countries we´ve visited, is the fact that domestic animals run loose and species mix indiscriminately. We see horses untethered by the side of the road, cattle walking down the highway, pigs on the beach, packs of dogs roaming free, and of course chickens and turkeys everywhere. Surprisingly, though, I have seen very few stray or free roaming cats here. 

 http://twitter.com/RabiesControl (July 2, 2009)

 

As reported June 15, 2009 by Robin Hughes, DVM:

 

Please also see:

 

http://www.rabiescontrol.net/EN/Programs/Projects-Overview/USNS_Comfort.html

 

The following is a blog entry composed by both myself and Dr. Cynthia Hoobler, who is here with me on this leg of the deployment.

 

Summary of our mission in Tumaco, Colombia

 

Tumaco is an area where many factors favoring the transmission of rabies to humans occurs.  One factor is large numbers of stray (and unaltered) dogs come in contact with children.  Most of these dogs are not vaccinated for rabies; of approximately one hundred dogs we saw, only two had a current rabies vaccine.  Children carry the local dogs by grabbing the front legs or both the front and back legs, and haul them bodily to the desired location.  This positions the dog's head at the level of the child's face, making it easy for a bite to occur.

 

Additionally, the country of Colombia is in a state of "civil war" due to well-organized and well funded narcoterrorism.  This constant unrest causes disruption in the villages, so that local people leave their homes and animals while seeking safety.  We observed local villagers that had fled from their homes following a clash between the Colombian military and the FARC, a terrorist organization.  These clashes are common. 

 

Without adequate stray dog control and vaccination, rabies will remain a problem for the population in rural Colombia.

 

Robin Hughes, DVM

Cynthia Hoobler, DVM, MPH, DACVPM

_________________________________________________________

 

 

As reported June 10, 2009 by Robin Hughes, DVM:

 

Please see:

 

http://www.rabiescontrol.net/EN/Programs/Projects-Overview/USNS_Comfort.html

 

Date: June 10. 2009

Location: Tumaco, COLOMBIA

“We are staying ashore in Tumaco, Colombia. The thrust of the mission here is vaccination of the small and large animals. We are handing out a lot of the rabies brochures as well, and the people seem grateful for the information. Cynthia Hoobler, a Public Health veterinarian from Texas, U.S. has joined us, and we are happy to have her perspective on things. I won´t be able to send any photos until I get back on the ship, which will be another week.”  

 

Footnote:  Dr. Cynthia Hoobler, now on board with Dr. Hughes is a prominent One Health supporter who has worked closely with the doyen of veterinary public health, James H. Steele, DVM, MPH. 

 

Cynthia Hoobler, DVM, MPH

1901 Valero

Friendswood, TX   77546

281.482.4927

cynthia.hoobler@yahoo.com

 

EDUCATION            DVM Texas A&M University 1979 magna cum laude

                                    Licensed in Texas

MPH (Master of Public Health) UT School of Public Health 1982

Diplomat American College of Veterinary Preventive Medicine

Continuing Education Emphasis - Public Health

                                    BS Animal Science Texas A&M University

      1976 summa cum laude

 

EXPERIENCE          Currently Professor San Jacinto College and

                                    Clinical Relief Veterinarian for Banfield The Pet Hospital

                                         Small animals, exotics, avians, public health consultant

                                         Spokesperson on Zoonotic Diseases

                                    Houston SPCA, large and small animals, surgery

                                    Chief Editor for General Biology I and II Lab

                                                Manual McGraw Hill 1^st, 2nd, and 3^rd Edition

                                    Royalties donated for Biology Scholarships

LCDR United States Public Health Service- Veterinary Services      Inactive Reserve

NVRT National Veterinary Resource Team

NAHER National Animal Health Emergency Response USDA   APHIS Veterinary Services

TXSART Texas State Animal Resource Team- charter member

 

                                    Veterinary Clinical Associate- Texas A&M University; taught

                                                Senior veterinary students

                                    Adjunct Professor University of Houston at Clear Lake

                                                Taught Human Anatomy and Physiology

                                    Adjunct Professor College of the Mainland: Texas City

                                                Taught General Biology I and II, Human Anatomy and

                                                            Physiology I and II

                                    Assistant Director of Public Health Pasadena Health 1983-1984

                                    Department- responsible for Epidemiology of Disease and

                                    Food borne illness, Animal Control, Environmental Health,

                                    Restaurant Inspection, Disease Surveillance, Public Education

                                    Supervise Registered Sanitarians          

 

                                   

                                    Internship World Health Organization - Copenhagen, Denmark

Summer 1983

Disease Investigation, Research for Publication, Animal Husbandry, Meat Inspection, Foreign Animal Diseases

 

Oral Rabies Vaccination Program - Fox 1 year and Coyote 1 year               

World Rabies Day 2007 and 2008 Coordinated Rabies Vaccination Clinics at San Jacinto College, Houston, Texas

Veterinarian Sponsor for SCAVMA Student Chapter American Veterinary Medical Association World Rabies Day Clinic at

Texas A&M University

 

Department of State Health Services Texas Basic Disaster Course

Smallpox Clinical and Vaccination Course

Member for Texas Disaster Force

 

HONORS                   Who’s Who College Professors 2005

Who’s Who Among Executive and Professional Women in Veterinary Care 2005/2006

 

PUBLICATIONS       Brucella canis Transmission from Canine to Human, Texas Preventable Diseases

                                    Presentation US Public Health Service – Globalization of

                                                Veterinary Public Health

Veterinary Public Health: Past Successes: Italiana Veterinary Journal, Co-author 2008.

Poverty, Population and Plagues.  Presented at the World Veterinary Congress in Canada 2008.

Assistant Editor: One Man, One Medicine, The James H. Steele Story.  To be published summer 2009 –

 

Dr. Steele’s principal biographer is another valued One Health supporter/advocate:

Craig N. Carter, DVM, MS, PhD, Dipl ACVPM

Director and Professor, Epidemiology
Livestock Disease Diagnostic Center
College of Agriculture

College of Public Health
University of Kentucky
1490 Bull Lea Road
P.O. Box 14125
Lexington, KY  40512-4125

 

 

 

June 1, 2006 -  Update:  Reported by Dr. Hughes and Rabies Alliance from Panama City, Panama

http://www.rabiescontrol.net/EN/Programs/Projects-Overview/USNS_Comfort.html

As reported May 26, 2009 by Robin Hughes, DVM:

 

Please see:

 

http://www.rabiescontrol.net/EN/Programs/Projects-Overview/USNS_Comfort.html 

 

 

……“We are in Colon, Panama.  This morning, we visited the Ministry of Agriculture to determine what their needs are for our mission.  Their main concerns are bot flies, screw worm, and rabies.  The Ministry, in conjunction with the USDA, carries out the screw worm eradication program, whereby adult male flies are irradiated and released, thereby insuring their sterility.  In this particular area of Panama, the screw worm is present, and we are checking the cattle, goats, and other livestock for this parasite when we process them for vaccines and deworming.    We are vaccinating all the livestock and small animals for rabies, which is present in this area.  Vampire bats are an important vector here.  The Ministry practices night-time capture of bats and testing for rabies.” ………

One Health advocate, Robin Hughes, DVM is on board the USNS Comfort representing the Alliance for Rabies Control…Dr. Hughes will be writing a blog and transmitting photos of her activities.  These will be published on the link below which will be periodically included on this News page of the One Health Initiative website as they are transmitted.

Please see website link:

http://www.rabiescontrol.net/EN/Programs/Projects-Overview/USNS_Comfort.html

USNS Comfort

In partnership with the U.S. Navy, the Alliance for Rabies Control has joined the United States Naval Ship (USNS) Comfort in providing humanitarian aid throughout Central America.

Over three months time, the Alliance will sail to Colombia, El Salvador, Nicaragua and Panama to provide much needed information and resources on various zoonotic diseases with special emphasis on rabies.

This effort would not be possible without the help of numerous partners and the Alliance would like to thank the American Veterinary Medical Association, Ministry of Health of Chile and the One Health Initiative for their support.      

Click here to view the USNS Comfort Scheme of Maneuver.

Arrival date May 16. 2009

New ProMED “One Health” Initiative Launched Targeting Physicians, Veterinarians and other public health workers in Anglophone Africa – June 30, 2009

I am pleased to announce this new enterprise targeting physicians and veterinarians in Anglophone Africa, complementing ProMED-FRA which does the same for francophone Africa.  These are not duplicates from the English ProMED lists, but have a specific regional focus.

ProMED-EAFR is collaboration between ProMED and the East Africa Integrated Disease Surveillance Network (EAIDSNet), which is a joint effort of the Ministries of Health of Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda as well as national health research and academic institutions. The objective of this initiative between the International Society for Infectious Disease (ISID) and EAIDSNet is to facilitate access to outbreak information on the part of physicians, veterinarians and other public health workers throughout English-speaking Africa. Subscription to ProMED-EAFR is free of charge.

See http://eafr.promedmail.org

Provided by:

One Health Initiative Website ProMED Contents Manager

John (Jack) Woodall, MA, PhD, Director (retd.)
Nucleus for the Investigation of Emerging Infectious Diseases

Institute of Medical Biochemistry

Center for Health Sciences

Federal University

Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

June 17, 2009

Death of Former CDC Employee and noted Rabies Expert - George M. Baer, DVM, MPH

Dr. George Martin Baer, a former CDC employee in the Division of Viral & Rickettsial Diseases, died on June 2, 2009, in Mexico City, Mexico, at the age of 73. He was an eminent virologist, veterinarian, and public health scientist. Dr. Baer was born during 1936 in London, England. He grew up in New Rochelle, New York, where he became an accomplished equestrian, and began a lifelong love of animals. He attended Cornell University, where he obtained an undergraduate degree in agricultural sciences in 1954, and a degree in veterinary medicine in 1959. He earned a Master´s degree in Public Health from the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor during 1961. Thereafter, Dr. Baer started his career in public health with CDC via the EIS, and was assigned to the New York State Health Department in Albany, where he focused upon brucellosis, psittacosis, and rabies. In 1964, he worked at CDC’s Southwest Rabies Investigations Laboratory in Las Cruces New Mexico on bat rabies. During 1966 to 1969, he was a consultant to the Pan American Health Organization in Mexico. Based upon his efforts, he helped to lay the groundwork for Mexico’s public health programs against rabies, an effort he continued throughout the rest of his professional life. In 1969, he returned to Atlanta, and became head of the CDC Rabies Laboratory. With his team of researchers, he developed a method for the immunization of wildlife, for which he was credited as the “Father of Oral Rabies Vaccination”. His considerable expertise made him one of the foremost international experts in this arena. Of his more than 100 publications, his 1991 book, The Natural History of Rabies, remains a definitive reference in the field. After retirement from CDC, he founded a diagnostic laboratory in Mexico City, and was a member of the Mexican International Steering Committee for the Rabies in the Americas Conference. At the time of his death, he was working on a new vaccine for influenza, a timely project given the recent outbreak of the H1N1 virus. Clearly, Dr. Baer acted from a deeply held belief in the power of preventive medicine, within the ‘one health’ concept to combat disease both in humans and other animals. He is survived by his wife, Maria Olga Baer, three daughters, Katherine Baer, of Washington, D.C., Alexandra Baer, of New Paltz, New York, and Isabella Baer, of Mexico City, and four granddaughters. Funeral services were held in Mexico City at the Iglesia de Santa Rosa de Lima on June 4, 2009.

The preceding was provided by Peter Costa, MPH, CHES, Global Communications Coordinator, Global Alliance for Rabies Control http://www.rabiescontrol.net/ :

“We were all deeply saddened to hear of the death of Dr. George Baer on June 2, 2009.  We include the announcement about Dr. Baer’s death that was released from CDC [above].”

AVIAN Influenza Toolkit  -  May 25, 2009

http://www.aitoolkit.org/Default.aspx

The Australian Government Department of Agriculture Fisheries & Forestry (DAFF) has conducted a project aimed at assisting APEC member economies to enhance their social, political and institutional arrangements to better prepare for and respond to the threat of H5N1 highly pathogenic avian influenza (HPAI) and other emerging infectious diseases (EIDs).

The initiative was an outcome of the June 2007 APEC ATCWG workshop, ‘Sharing experiences with the management of the avian influenza H5N1 threat’, held in Bangkok in which participants identified the need for a practical policy implementation toolkit that captured the knowledge and experience of animal health professionals working in the SE Asian region . 

Consequently the Avian Influenza Toolkit was developed as a web-based resource that contains management guidelines, information resources, case studies and examples of practical tools to assist countries to implement strengthened animal disease preparedness and response measures.  The Toolkit will include practical experiences of countries and experts on emergency animal disease prevention, preparedness, response, control, and management, combining their experience, guidance and tools into an accessible resource.  The Toolkit will evolve with international policy developments and technical advances, and will be continuously updated as new ‘best practice’ case studies emerge. 

Toolkit elements

The Toolkit is constructed in modules based upon key elements critical to effective animal (zoonotic) disease prevention, preparedness, control and response.  These elements have been developed from the United Nations System Influenza Coordination (UNSIC) six Success Factors  which summarise effective preparedness and control strategies that determine a country’s success or otherwise in dealing with emergency animal diseases and the New Delhi Roadmap - a 21-point vision and roadmap for dealing with avian and pandemic influenza adopted at the New Delhi Ministerial Conference on Avian and Pandemic Influenza in December 2007. 

Examples of Toolkit content include: guidelines on the development of compensation schemes, practical advice and case studies on the implementation of vaccination strategies, biosecurity and operating standards for live bird markets, examples of animal health legislation, examples of effective models for private-public sector partnerships.  

Project activities

A Steering Group comprising representatives from Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, Australia and the United Nations System Influenza Coordinator (UNSIC), provides overarching guidance and direction to the Toolkit development and administration. 

An initial workshop was held in June 2008 (attended by APEC member economies, South East Asian countries and international agencies), to consider user requirements, information needs, best-practice implementation strategies and issues for inclusion in Toolkit. 

A second workshop in September 2008 evaluated and reviewed the Toolkit in preparation for the launch at the 6^th International Ministerial Conference on Avian and Pandemic Influenza at Sharm El-Sheikh, Egypt in October 2008. A focus of the Ministerial conference was the management of zoonotic disease risks at the animal–human interface.

Throughout the Toolkit’s development, a significant body of work emerged as it became apparent that the true value of the Toolkit would be found in the sharing of country experiences.  To date however, very little of this information has been documented and shared.  APEC member economies agreed that ongoing work was necessary and should be commissioned to continue capturing and documenting country experiences and case studies for inclusion in the website.  Australia will continue this work in conjunction with APEC member economies and others who wish to share their experiences with the management of avian influenza.

The website is a global resource that complements existing information sources and technical agency websites and has been compiled with the assistance and cooperation of the APEC economies and international agencies which have provided material for the Elements. We invite you to use the toolkit and to consider the website as a forum for the promotion and dissemination of new material relating to AI and other emerging infectious diseases.

Provided by:

Dr. Rhyll Vallis

Strategic Policy & Projects

Office of the Chief Veterinary Officer

Product Integrity & Animal and Plant Health

Department of Agriculture, Fisheries and Forestry

Ph: 6272 3148

M.2.118

The SAPUVETNET III Project Contributing to the Millennium Development Goals through the One Health Concept

 (http://www.sapuvetnet.org/), funded by the European Union (DCI-LA/2008/75), aims to contribute to the discussion of various aspects of Public Health that require a multidisciplinary approach.

Rabies is a serious problem in many African and Latin American countries.

Although it has been successfully controlled in many European countries, there are still cases of rabies registered every year in animals and it is currently classified as a neglected disease by the WHO.

This e-conference (1 to 7 June) aims to stimulate debate and contribute to the development of a frame embracing the socio-economic, ecological and epidemiological factors that determine the disease pattern worldwide, and that could help the development of more effective strategies for disease control in the field. Different questions will be explored:

1. What is the real dimension of rabies in different eco-geographical scenarios?

2. Which human behaviours and beliefs contribute to the failure of vaccination campaigns?

3. How to promote responsible pet ownership? Are there any differences between urban and rural context?

4. What are the economic aspects that challenge the success of the animal vaccination campaigns?

5. What organizational aspects have to be put in place? How to communicate effectively with pet owners?

6. How to adapt the different experiences to different local realities?

If you have constructive ideas on one or more aspect of this important disease and would like to share them with us, please participate in this e-conference http://projectos.moodle.uevora.pt/course/category.php?id=3 .

1 to 7 June

The results will be valuable contributions to the World Rabies Day that will be promoted throughout the world in September.

(http://www.worldrabiesday.org/ ).

Instructions to participate in the e-conference.

1. Enter the website http://projectos.moodle.uevora.pt/ (if your browser inquires you on the safety of the certificates do not worry, it is a safe website).
2. Search "PROJECTS" and enter.
3. Access "Preparing the RABIES WORLD DAY 2009".
4. Choose the language in the upper right corner (ES, EN, PT).
5. On the next page you can choose between the following:

Ø                Access with user name and password for users already registered.

Ø                 Create a new user account: All who are accessing Moodle for the first time should register as new user and START CREATING A NEW ACCOUNT. Complete the register form and select Create My New Account.

FOR NEW USERS:
You should see the following instructions after having submitted your form:
"We have sent an email to XXXXX@XXXX.XXX (your email)
There are simple instructions to complete the process.
If you have any difficulty, contact your system administrator. “
Please follow the instructions sent to your email to activate your new account! 

  NECESSARY FOR ALL USERS (new and already registered):

To sign up for: "Preparing the RABIES WORLD DAY 2009":
Search: Management and select ENROLL ME IN THIS COURSE
Enter a enrollment key for access to the discipline: sapuvetnet3

After accessing the content of "Preparing the RABIES WORLD DAY 2009" you can edit what is in blue. Under each "diagram of subjects" you can see sub themes identified as "Discussion Forum", "Chat Room", etc… Selecting these links you may create a new topic of discussion, comment on a previously created, add a topic to chat ...
Selecting the "links" in blue appear different options to add, for example, file attachments on "Attach file". Explore the different options for more flexibility!

An Important Newsweek Letter-to-the Editor from:

 Laura H. Kahn, MD – May 16, 2009  (Scroll down to third letter)

http://www.newsweek.com/id/197887?tid=relatedcl

In response to the following:

The Path of a Pandemic

How one virus spread from pigs and birds to humans around the globe. And why microbes like the H1N1 flu have become a growing threat.

By Laurie Garrett | NEWSWEEK

Published May 2, 2009

From the magazine issue dated May 18, 2009

http://www.newsweek.com/id/195692

Press Release January, 2009

Book Signing Announced for Jim Steele Biography

American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) Meeting, Seattle, 2009

Dr. Craig N. Carter, author of One Man, One Medicine, One Health—the James H. Steele Story and Dr. Cynthia Hoobler, editorial assistant, hereby announce a book-signing to be hosted by the American College of Veterinary Preventive Medicine (ACVPM) at the AVMA meeting in Seattle this July.  Dr. Steele will meet and greet attendees at the ACVPM booth in the exhibit hall and will personally sign any book that is purchased.   All proceeds of book sales will benefit the Steele Endowed Lecture Series and the James H. Steele Professorship of Epidemiology at the University of Texas, School of Public Health, Houston, Texas.  

Dr. Steele founded the veterinary division of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) in 1947.  He then boldly introduced the principles of veterinary public health to the U.S. and countries all around the globe.  His outstanding achievements have helped the world to realize higher standards of living through a better understanding of the epidemiology of diseases shared by animals and man.   As a U.S. Public Health Service officer, he became the first Assistant Surgeon General for Veterinary Affairs and later was appointed as Deputy Assistant Secretary for Health & Human Services at the rank of Admiral (two stars).   He has received numerous awards over his illustrious career to include the Surgeon General’s Medallion in 2006, presented by SG Richard H. Carmona.  He is the only veterinarian to ever receive that prestigious award.

The biography begins with Jim’s birth and scrappy childhood in Chicago and takes the reader through his formal education, early work experiences and on through to his retirement from CDC in 1971.   Family and personal experiences are weaved into the story to include real-life adventure, success, tragedy and humor.  After leaving CDC, Dr. Steele began a prominent second career as a Professor of Environmental Health at the University of Texas, School of Public Health.  There he compiled and edited the world’s first comprehensive series of books on diseases shared by animals and man, the CRC Handbook Series on Zoonoses.  At the ripe young age of 95, he continues to lecture, consult, mentor, advise, write, and inspire.  The story of Jim Steele’s life is stirring to us all, in and outside the allied health professions.  He is a true pioneer in the evolving philosophy of One Medicine, One Health, One World.  He has been called by many of his colleagues The Father of Veterinary Public Health.

For those who cannot attend the AVMA meeting in Seattle, please watch for Dr. Steele’s biography on www.Amazon.com coming soon.

Questions:  Contact Dr. Craig N. Carter, 859-253-0571 (office), 859-433-5472 (cell) or email to craig.carter@uky.edu

ONE HEALTH Project: Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and the Government of the People’s Republic of China

Information is public domain from the website:

www.agriteam.ca/projects/profile/livestock-health-extension-services-project-lhesp

Can be posted and distributed.

Provided May 15, 2009 by:

Jane Pritchard BA, DVM, MVetSc

Site Manager/LTTA Gansu and Chongqing 

Livestock Health Extension Services Project 

Agriteam Canada

Rm 408/413 East Wing Yasheng Building

No.  105 Qin’an Road, Chengguan District 

Lanzhou, Gansu 7300300

Jane.pritchard@ccag.com.cn

China, (Xinjiang, Gansu, Sichuan, Chongqing, Shaanxi, IMAR, Jilin), Livestock Health Extension Services Project (LHESP): November 2005–March 2011

Sector: Agriculture and Agribusiness
Region: North and Central Asia
Funded by:
Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA) and the Government of the People’s Republic of China
Total Value: Canadian contribution: C$20 million; Chinese contribution: C$20 million
Partners and Counterparts:
In China: Ministry of Agriculture, Beijing; Provincial Animal Husbandry Bureaus and Agriculture Bureaus

Purpose

To contribute to a better quality of life—including improved public health, farm productivity and increased incomes—for poor rural women and men in western regions by controlling animal diseases. The new, sustainable approaches to the prevention and control of zoonotic diseases introduced through the project improve individual and public health and contribute to global public health. The long-term impacts include:

§               improved capacity of livestock producers, including smallholders, to prevent and control zoonotic diseases

§               reduced inequality between coastal and western provinces

§               improved systems, policy and institutional capacity for the management of livestock health in an equitable and sustainable manner including improved food safety and compliance with international quality control standards and protocols as established by the OIE (the World Organization for Animal Health) and the World Trade Organization (WTO)

Challenge

China has seen dramatic increases in the local consumption of animal products. This has created the opportunity for value-added livestock production to lift poor, subsistence western farmers out of poverty. However, smallholders remain particularly vulnerable to the continuing threat of animal disease, which could quickly destroy their livelihoods. Unsafe and unhealthy livestock farming practices pose significant animal and human health risks and could undo many benefits that have been achieved to date. An animal health extension system that responds to the needs of smallholders is essential to meet the growing demand for safe and healthy livestock products, fulfill WTO/OIE standards and support sustainable economic and social development of the western regions.

Approach

The LHESP uses an integrated approach that links national livestock health policy reforms with innovative regulatory frameworks for delivery, monitoring and evaluation at the farm level and in the marketplace. Training programs in Canada and China expose senior decision makers to new, OIE-compliant policy and regulatory options and contribute to more effective policy development. The LHESP engages all levels of government as well as the private sector, farmers’ association and the farmers themselves.  Village-based pilot projects ensure that policy links to practice in a way that leads to the development of a sustainable, effective system of livestock health extension.

Project Description

The LHESP promotes public health through the prevention and control of animal diseases by assisting China to meet its OIE compliance requirements. This contributes directly to good governance, transparency and reliable information sharing between international parties. Capacity building is carried out with institutional partners such as the Ministry of Agriculture (MOA) Veterinary Bureau, the China Center for Animal Disease Control and the China Animal Health and Epidemiology Center.

Good governance in animal health services also involves establishing partnerships with the private sector, including private veterinary practitioners, agribusinesses and farmers. Each of these stakeholders has an important role to play in the prevention, detection and control of animal diseases. These industry participants are actively involved in the project’s planning, training and pilot activities.

Results

The LHESP is working closely with the Government of China to support the reform of veterinary services and the delivery of new, participatory extension services. Results include:

1.             An enhanced enabling environment for the delivery of OIE-compliant livestock health services to poor women and men in western regions

2.             Increased capacity of government policies and programs to locally meet the needs of China’s growing livestock industry and globally meet international animal health standards by delivering high quality, needs-based livestock health services to small, medium and large-scale livestock producers (women, men and ethnic minorities) in a participatory and sustainable manner

3.             Greater capacity of individual veterinarians and animal health workers (women, men and ethnic minorities) through improved education and skills with an emphasis on needs-based participatory training methodologies and the capacity to deliver OIE-compliant animal health services to prevent and control animal diseases

Dear Colleagues,

We are pleased to inform you that we recently launched our "One Health Network" website (www.onehealthnet.be). The objective of this website is to stimulate interactions between the medical and the veterinary sectors, particularly in low-resource regions.

Practically, the website suscitates discussions on "One Health" issues through literature reviews. Reactions on the reviews are encouraged and will be posted on the website after evaluation. In addition, Refman lists of references can be downloaded and imported in your own reference databases.

Everybody is welcome to submit a review on a "One Health" subject for open discussion with the scientific community.

We kindly invite you to visit the website. Any comment or suggestion is welcome (onehealthnet@itg.be). You are also welcome to invite other scientists to join the network, visit our website and make contributions (you can possibly send me email addresses to include in our mailing lists).

Tanguy Marcotty, DVM, PhD

Department of Animal Health

Institute of Tropical Medicine

Nationalestraat 155

B 2000 Antwerp

Fax: +32.3.247.62.68

Phone:

  Office:                +32.3.247.62.63

  Teleworking:           +32.86.40.17.03

  Cellular:              +32.472.85.53.96

 The One Health Initiative has been endorsed by the American Physiological Society.

Please see published letter from President Dr. Irving H. Zucker and Executive Director Dr. Martin Frank below and on the Publication page of this website:

 Dear Drs. Kahn, Kaplan, and Monath:

   After reviewing the mission statement of the One Health Initiative, I

 am  pleased to inform you that The American Physiological Society has

 endorsed  the Initiatives strategy of improving the lives of all

 species—human  and animal—through the integration of human medicine

 and veterinary  medicine.  The strategy is consistent with the

 Society’s vision of  the role of physiology in global health as

 detailed by APS Past-President  Hannah V. Carey in an article that

 appeared in the Society’s  newsletter, _The Physiologist_ ([LINK:

 http://www.the-aps.org/publications/tphys/2007html/April/apspresident.

 htm] 

 http://www.the-aps.org/publications/tphys/2007html/April/apspresident.htm).

 Consequently, the Society would be pleased to be listed as a

 supporter of  the One Health Initiative.

    Sincerely yours,

  Irving H. Zucker, Ph.D.

    President

    Cc:       APS Council

    Martin Frank, Ph.D.

    Executive Director, American Physiological Society

    9650 Rockville Pike, Bethesda,  MD 20814-3991  USA

 APS Home Page: www.the-aps.org

  ... Integrating the Life Sciences From Molecule to Organism

The following was graciously provided by:

Robert Taylor, Content Manager

Animal, Human & Social Sciences, CABI Head Office

Nosworthy Way

Wallingford

Oxfordshire

OX10 8DE

United Kingdom

News release

 Free access to world-renowned public health database to assist swine-flu effort

1 May 2009 

CABI today has announced free access to its specialist Global Health database – the definitive database for public health information – www.cabdirect.org/globalhealth

 Simultaneously CABI has developed a Swine flu 'dashboard' that brings together up-to-the-minute information on the virus (http://www.netvibes.com/cabialerts).The 'dashboard' includes resources from CABI and critical advice from key health organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and Centers for Disease Control (CDC).

 "Our mission is to help people worldwide through the provision of scientific knowledge," said Dr Trevor Nicholls, CEO of CABI. "Today we are offering our most applicable resource, over the coming weeks, to help health professionals and others working on the front line."

 In a fast changing sequence of events that has led to the rapid escalation of concern from WHO, and the reaction of national governments in considering their response to a possible influenza pandemic, release of the database is designed to give urgently needed support to those who need it most: scientists, medical professionals and health authorities investigating the causes and treatments of the disease and linkages to past outbreaks.

 Influenza researchers urgently need to be able to refer back to previous scientific work in this area to understand the behaviour of previous strains of the virus and to research effective mechanisms for handling earlier outbreaks.

 The Global Health database brings together global knowledge on every aspect of influenza since 1910. The knowledge it contains could provide a key weapon in health researchers' response in understanding and controlling the virus.

 Much of the data in Global Health is derived from publications that have long since vanished. They tell us a great deal about past pandemics, from rates and patterns of transmission, duration, timing of epidemiological peaks, geographical distribution of the disease, government preparedness and quarantine provisions through to effects on different age and social groups, severity in developing versus developed countries, symptoms, causes of mortality (secondary problems, especially pneumonia, were devastating in the Spanish flu) and mortality rates.

 By opening the door to a wealth of historical information on past pandemics, the Global Health database has the potential to reveal vital clues in the international fight against swine flu (influenza A – H1N1).

 Global Health database - www.cabdirect.org/globalhealth

CABI Swine Flu Dashboard - http://www.netvibes.com/cabialerts

 Media contact: Sarah Wilson, PR and Corporate Communications Manager, tel: +44 (0) 1491 829 361, mob: +44 (0) 7516 928 845, email: s.wilson@cabi.org

 Editor's notes

About CABI

CABI is a not-for-profit science-based development and information organization. Its mission and direction are influenced by member countries that help guide the activities undertaken. These include publishing; development projects and research; and microbial services. CABI produces key scientific information, including CAB Abstracts – the world-renowned bibliographic database covering agriculture and the environment. CABI also publishes multimedia compendia, books, e-books and full text internet resources aiming to further science and its application to real life. Our expertise includes animal and veterinary sciences, entomology, plant sciences, environmental sciences, human health, parasitology, mycology, crop protection, rural economics, rural development and leisure and tourism. For more information go to www.cabi.org

About the Global Health database

The Global Health database is published by CABI which has recorded public health and veterinary research since 1910. Global Health is the only specialist bibliographic abstracting and indexing database dedicated to public health research and practice. With more than two million records, Global Health is the definitive international public health database for academics, researchers, NGOs, policy makers, clinicians, healthcare professionals and students. The database covers all pathogens relevant to human health, including swine flu.

P Think Green - don't print this email unless you really need to

Heather K. Moberly, AHIP, Professor,

Veterinary Medicine Librarian

William E. Brock Memorial Library

Center for Veterinary Health Sciences

102 McElroy Hall

Oklahoma State University

Stillwater OK 74078-2013

405.744.6655

heather.k.moberly@okstate.edu

http://www.library.okstate.edu/vetmed  

The following News item was provided by:

Ronald D. Warner, DVM, MPVM, PhD, DACVPM, ACE
Assoc Professor (epidemiology, prev med, public health)
Dept of Family and Community Medicine, School of Medicine

Director, Travel Medicine Clinic
Texas Tech Univ. Health Sciences Center
3601 4th Street
Lubbock, TX  79430-8143

 OBITUARY: JANE BROTHERTON WALKER

A ProMED-mail post

<http://www.promedmail.org>

ProMED-mail is a program of the

International Society for Infectious Diseases <http://www.isid.org>

Date: Sun 19 Apr 2009

From: Gert J Venter <venterg@arc.agric.za>

Jane Brotherton Walker (expert acarologist), 1925-2009

 ------------------------------------------------------

Jane Brotherton Walker was born in Nairobi, Kenya on 31 Jan 1925. As a child growing up on a farm in Kenya Jane was home-schooled by her mother during her primary school years, and then went to England where she matriculated in 1944 at the County High School for Girls in Retford. Jane obtained BSc (Honours) and MSc degrees at Liverpool University in 1948 and 1959, and was awarded a DSc degree on her published works by the University of the Witwatersrand, Johannesburg in 1983.

Jane was first employed in 1949 in the Research Branch of Her Majesty's Overseas Civil Service as a research officer in the East African Veterinary Research Organization, Muguga, Kenya. She progressed in this organization to senior scientific officer and then principal scientific officer, before voluntarily retiring from Her Majesty's Service in 1966 to take up a post as senior professional officer at the Veterinary Research Institute, Onderstepoort, upon the retirement of Dr Gertrud Theiler. There, Jane spent the rest of her working life. At the Institute she progressed through the ranks of promotion to chief professional officer, chief veterinary researcher, and specialist scientist until her retirement on pension in 1990. After retirement she continued to work at Onderstepoort in an honorary capacity for 3 days a week until 1998. During her working life and even after her retirement Jane was sole, senior, or co-author of 53 scientific publications and 5 books (inter alia, The _Rhipicephalus_ species ticks of the World, 2000) and the descriptions of 18 new tick species. She illustrated many of the ticks that she described with meticulously executed line drawings.

Jane's prowess as a scientist was recognized by her peers and she received

3 of the most prestigious awards in the field of biological sciences in South Africa, namely the 1988 Elsdon-Dew Medal of the Parasitological Society of Southern Africa, for services rendered to Parasitology in Africa, the Agricultural Science and Technology Woman of the Year Award for 1998, and the Theiler Memorial Trust Award in 1998 for exceptional service rendered to Veterinary Science in Africa. Her scientific writing skills were soon recognized at Onderstepoort and she was a member of the Editorial Committee of the Onderstepoort Journal of Veterinary Research from 1969 until 2000, a function she performed punctiliously to the dismay, as well as to the advantage of many a sloppy author.

With Jane's death the scientific world has lost one of its most meticulous and experienced workers, and the field of tick taxonomy, particularly in Africa, will be infinitely poorer. Her friends have lost a true lady and a loyal friend.

Jane died peacefully at home in Pretoria on Friday morning 3 Apr 2009 while having tea with Ivan Horak.

[byline: Ivan G Horak]

- --Gert J Venter, Senior Researcher, PVVD, Onderstepoort Veterinary Institute Agricultural Research Council South Africa <venterg@arc.agric.za> <http://www.arc.agric.za>

Dynamic Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (JAVMA) and strong One Health Advocate Dies

Dr. Janis H. Audin (MS IL ’75, DVM IL '79), a champion of progressive veterinary medical journalism and “One Health” died April 22, 2009 following a long, courageous and difficult battle with pancreatic cancer. The world has lost a truly significant One Health leader and advocate.  Under her guidance, the Journal of the American Veterinary Medical Association (JAVMA) implemented a ‘one-health wonders’ column that recognized and highlighted prominent One Health individuals among the medical and veterinary medical professions in the United States.  The American Veterinary Medical Association (AVMA) has lost a dedicated and gifted editor-in-chief.

Dr. Audin joined the editorial staff of the AVMA in 1985, as an assistant editor and was promoted to associate editor in 1989 and editor in 1994. She became the editor-in-chief of both the JAVMA and the American Journal of Veterinary Research in 1995.  Prior to that Dr. Audin practiced as an associate veterinarian in Calumet City, Ill., for four years,

During her tenure, Dr. Audin was noted for implementing procedural and technological changes in the journal to reduce costs, improve timeliness of publications, and promote readership interest and awareness. New features in the news section introduced under her leadership have made the journals more practice and public health-relevant.  For instance, Dr. Audin fostered the United States Department of Agriculture’s Food Safety and Inspection Service (USDA-FSIS) “Inspection Insights”—a public health oriented food safety monthly column related to meat, poultry and egg products—from 1996 through 1998.  She also increased international manuscript submissions.

On March 23, 2009 AVMA Executive Vice President Dr. W. Ron DeHaven named Dr. Audin as editor-in-chief emeritus of the Publications Division. Wisely, it also meant that Dr. Audin could continue contributing to the staff effort to ensure the high quality of the AVMA scientific journals while the Association began a comprehensive search for her successor.

Having observed the JAVMA editors-in-chief for 50 years, I consider her one of the best, if not the best of a most distinguished list.  Janis was a special personal friend and my soul mate with respect to dealing with life-threatening cancer.  I deeply mourn her loss and will miss her.

 Bruce Kaplan, DVM

Please see JAVMA NEWS article:

April 13, 2009

ONE HEALTH NEWSLETTER - 2009 Spring Issue Published …

http://www.doh.state.fl.us/Environment/medicine/One_Health/OHNLSpring2009.pdf  

The One Health Newsletter’s 2009 Spring Issue is now published online.  It contains a variety of interesting and pertinent One Health articles.

Among items of note is the lead article entitled “Emerging Pathogens Institute, University of Florida” by J. Glenn Morris Jr., MD, MPH & TM.  Dr. Morris is the director of the Institute.

Publication page