We need a direct connection between climate change and the federal One Health Policy
Written by Chia Chun Angela Liang
COVID-19 has affected our society tremendously in different ways, in different sectors, and possibly on many different time scales around the world. Since the pandemic, One Health has evolved to improve the health of people, animals, and their environment, with a focus on animal diseases that could transfer from animals to humans (i.e., zoonoses). However, despite numerous solid research results, the federal efforts on One Health didn’t consider the direct connection between climate change and the prevalence of zoonotic diseases when seeking solutions.
To better prepare the country’s response and recovery from another possible zoonosis outbreak in the future, Congress directed the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to create a National One Health Framework in the 2021 House Appropriations Committee Report. The 2023 Consolidated Appropriations Act further directed the CDC to develop a One Health Coordination Mechanism to strengthen collaborations among federal network agencies. However, neither the framework nor the mechanism directly acknowledges that the impacts of COVID-19 cannot be effectively mitigated without considering the influence of climate change. To effectively develop a comprehensive system that better prepares us for future zoonotic disease outbreaks, the One Health Framework and Coordination Mechanism must consider the direct relations between climate change and zoonoses, quantify their impacts on multiple sectors, and identify the best response and recovery plans in all sectors.
According to science, studies have suggested that climate change influences the emergence, transmission, and expression of COVID-19 and possibly will have similar effects on other zoonoses in the future. Furthermore, numerous studies have shown that the warming temperature, prolonged vegetation growth period, and other climate change impacts increased the geographical spread of zoonotic diseases, as well as the survival and reproduction of pathogens and vectors.
A recent public notice from the CDC asking for all stakeholders’ inputs on the National One Health Framework was posted in late September 2023 at the Federal Register, the official journal of the federal government of the United States. Unfortunately, this notice didn’t receive the attention it deserved from the public and science communities and was closed in November 2023. Contrastingly, the annual climate change convention of the United Nations, COP28, which took place in Dubai from Nov 30 to Dec 12, emphasized the important relations between health and climate change by putting the topic of health for the first time on its agenda.
The interconnection between climate change and zoonotic diseases is clear, and together, their impacts across multiple sectors such as the food system, economy, and health, are destructive. For instance, in the United States alone, the economic loss from 2020 to 2023 due to COVID-19 is $14 trillion.
When seeking better solutions for federal One Health, a holistic, multisectoral approach is recommended. According to a review paper that studied over 100 peer-reviewed articles, actions should be taken in each of the following sectors:
- Food system
- Environment
- Economy
- Health system
- Global collective action
- Energy and technology,
- Policy and management
- Society and community
For instance, in the sector of the food system, one of the suggested actions from the review paper is to encourage climate-smart agriculture. Examples such as developing solar-powered precision sprayers, pumps, or milling in climate-smart agriculture are related to the promotion of renewable energy, a suggested action in the energy and technology sector. A green stimulus could be used to incentivize the transition of the energy and technology sector to renewable energy, which helps reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the environment sector and could be included in the recovery plans in the economy sector. Finally, designing evidence-based and just policy to incorporate recovery plans, green stimuli, renewable energy, and climate-smart agriculture requires integration in the policy and management sector. Plans in sectors are interconnected, but overall, plans in each sector for better One Health should align with the long-term, global sustainable and decarbonization goals, e.g., the Paris Agreement and the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
Hopefully, by recognizing the direct connection between climate change and zoonotic diseases and setting up One Health strategies and policies that incorporate climate solutions at the federal level, our country will be able to build up resilience and minimize the impact if ever hit by another zoonotic disease such as COVID-19 in the future.
Author: Angela is a PhD candidate in the Earth System Science Department at UC Irvine. Besides her PhD study, she has over 5 years of experience in science policy, advocacy, and diplomacy. Currently, Angela is a science policy scholar/intern at the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) and the Western Onboarding Chair at the National Science Policy Network. She is also the science and technology advisor at the Open Dialogues International Foundation.
