The UN Environment Programme (UNEP) has joined the One Health partnership, which includes the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO), the World Health Organization (WHO), and the World Organization for Animal Health (OIE), the WHO announced on Friday.
The Tripartite Collaboration for One Health formally became the Quadripartite at its annual executive meeting last week, when it signed a Memorandum of Understanding with UNEP, the OIE said.
One Health is an integrated approach that recognizes the connection between the health of people, animals and ecosystems.
According to the OIE, the four organizations will concentrate on the “One Health Joint Plan of Action, which includes six main action tracks: enhancing countries’ capacity to strengthen health systems under a One Health approach; reducing the risks from emerging or resurfacing zoonotic epidemics and pandemics; controlling and eliminating endemic zoonotic, neglected tropical or vector-borne diseases; strengthening the assessment, management and communication of food safety risks; curbing the silent pandemic of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) and better integrating the environment into the One Health approach.”
“We need to build a more comprehensive and coordinated One Health governance structure at а global level. We need a strong workforce, committed political will, and sustained financial investment. We need to develop a more proactive way of communicating and engaging across sectors, disciplines and communities to elicit the change we need,” WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus said.
UNEP’s Executive Director Inger Andersen said: “What is apparent to everyone involved in One Health is that no one sector can solve the many problems we face alone. To secure human, animal, and environment health – to secure the very future of this planet – we need more collaboration and partnerships. We need to stand together and work together if we are to thrive together. UNEP, as the newest full member of the Alliance, is ready to do its part as an equal partner.”
