Many virologists do not want to see a blanket ban on wet markets. Rather, they prefer a more nuanced approach and more narrow regulation to control their most dangerous aspects. To understand why, it helps to unpick what wet markets are, and their role in the feeding of billions of people. Continue reading
Category Archives: COVID19
Wildlife markets in the pandemic: Prohibit or preserve them? Ban or promote them?
ILRI and UN experts say preserve and protect the world’s ‘informal markets’ AND invest and enhance these markets, which provide billions of people
with food and incomes. Continue reading
The seven deadly drivers of zoonotic disease pandemics
A report released by the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP) and ILRI last month makes the case for focusing on the causes of pandemics instead of treating the diseases as they emerge, an argument echoed by many in the field. Continue reading
Scientists stress need, amid COVID-19, to maintain focus on everyday zoonotic diseases of the world’s poor
Most diseases that transmit from animals to humans (zoonoses) are not of the headline-grabbing, world-stopping variety write Eric Fèvre and Naomi Marks. They are an everyday reality for millions of people whose lives are quietly blighted or prematurely ended by diseases transmitted through farming and food systems. Continue reading
FOOD SAFETY: A point of departure for preventing diseases originating in the world’s food systems
To mark World Food Safety Day today, 7 June 2010, three of the world’s leading food safety experts investigate opportunities for building back better food systems and nutrition in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic. Continue reading
Twitter Moment: ILRI-UNEP explore ‘One Health’ at the Global Landscapes Forum
Twitter Moment: “ILRI-UNEP explore ‘One Health’ at the Global Landscapes Forum” Continue reading
COVID-19 gives the ‘One Health’ approach to tackling epidemics ‘global celebrity status’. Again.
Recent past pandemics, such as bird flu, swine flu and MERS likewise led to the potential of One Health being acclaimed. But the present COVID-19 pandemic reveals that the implementation of One Health has not matched its periodic celebrity status. So what is the problem? Continue reading
Are COVID-19 and other emerging infectious diseases a message from Mother Nature? —Leading Vietnamese media outlet interviews two of Vietnam’s Ecohealth experts
VTV1, the leading Vietnamese state-run media outlet, interviewed Hung Nguyen, regional representative for East and Southeast Asia and senior scientist at ILRI, and Tuyet Hanh Tran, associate professor at the Hanoi University of Public Health (HUPH) on the connections between ecosystem disruptions and infectious human diseases. Continue reading
Poor communities: Ground zero for emerging animal-to-human diseases—and for the existential crises they beget
Diseases that jump from animals to people are known by scientists as zoonoses. You may have heard of the headline-grabbing zoonoses named above. But others may be rather less familiar. Continue reading
Domestic livestock not a source of the COVID-19 disease—ILRI veterinary epidemiologist Eric Fevre
Eric Fèvre, professor of veterinary infectious diseases at the University of Liverpool and jointly appointed at the International Livestock Research Institute in Kenya, . . . says people should not be concerned about their domestic livestock becoming a COVID-19 source. Continue reading