Zoonotic diseases | One Health

Ebola a stark reminder of link between health of humans, animals, environment

November 14 2014November 14, 2014

By Emily Caldwell
Ohio State Research Communications

COLUMBUS, Ohio – For many, global public health seems like an abstract and distant problem – until the Ebola virus is diagnosed among people in our midst.

Though no one would call the Ebola pandemic a good thing, it has presented an opportunity for scientists to alert the public about the dire need to halt the spread of infectious diseases, especially in developing and densely populated areas of the world.

“What often seems like an abstract notion becomes very concrete when a deadly virus previously contained in Western Africa infects people on American soil,” said Wondwossen Gebreyes, professor of veterinary preventive medicine at The Ohio State University. “It does create a certain sense of urgency and awareness that this world is much smaller than we think.”

Gebreyes is the lead author of an article published in the Nov. 13, 2014, issue of PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases that makes the case for accelerating efforts to put “One Health” into action. One Health refers to a strategy to more fully understand and address the links between animal health, human health and the environment.

One Health Ethiopia featured in news article

October 20 2014October 20, 2014

Our One Health program was mentioned yesterday by The Columbus Dispatch in an article on Ohio State’s College of Veterinary Medicine.

Here’s an excerpt:

“About 75 percent of emerging diseases originate from animals,” said Dr. Wondwossen Gebreyes, the director of the infectious-diseases molecular epidemiology laboratory. “That’s why our work in veterinary medicine is crucial, not just to save animal life but also to save human lives.”

With growing interest in that link, Ohio State now offers a degree that can be completed in four years by combining a two-year master’s in public health with a four-year doctorate in veterinary medicine. Graduates can fill the demand for veterinary experts at agriculture companies and government health departments.

“They will be detectives of diseases, from the animal side,” said Dr. Armando Hoet, the coordinator of OSU’s veterinary public-health program.

Students learn how to wear protective gear to deal with Ebola, anthrax or other infectious diseases that can pass between humans and animals. They learn about bioterrorism and that 80 percent of agents that can be used as infectious weapons spread from animals.

“We train professionals to deal with those diseases both in the animal side and human side, and to prevent transmission from one population to the other,” Hoet said.

A summer program has started sending students to Ethiopia to look for ways to help prevent the spread of rabies. Other projects study whether salmonella bacteria strains from around the globe act differently and how influenza jumps from pigs to people at Ohio county fairs.

Read the full article on the Dispatch website >>

One health summer, in review

September 22 2014

By Wondwossen Gebreyes
Professor, Ohio State College of Veterinary Medicine
Chair, Ohio State One Health Task Force

This summer we had another highly successful One Health Institute. There are a number of elements that made the 2014 Summer Institute unique and satisfying.

First, I would like to thank all the Ohio State, Ethiopian as well as East African (including Kenya and Tanzania) students, staff, faculty, researchers and administrators who took part on this wonderful and productive time. I highlight below the key events and activities.

1. The 2014 One Health Summer Institute engaged more partners than in any of the previous years. We had an unprecedented 26 faculty and 32 students from more than 10 Ohio State units. We delivered numerous courses, and several key networks have been established in several areas of clinical, research and service learning aspects.

2. We conducted clinical training mainly with spay-neuter as part of our rabies pilot project.

3. We launched the rabies elimination pilot project with the participation of 40 key officials from various Ethiopian institutes, including academic, research, legislative and regulatory. We conducted a thorough assessment of the plan prior to launch. Other collaborating U.S. institutes, mainly CDC, played a key role in this.

4. We hosted trainees from Kenya and Tanzania in addition to the Ethiopian trainees. As part of our NIH-Fogarty program, we also hosted 12 trainees from the three nations for 45 days of intensive training in molecular epidemiology of food borne pathogens including laboratory sessions.

5. In addition, we also witnessed memorable learning moments for everyone:

The University of Gondar Diamond Jubilee is the key positive moment we all witnessed.

The flooding of the surgical suite in the middle of spaying of dogs was a great challenge for our team.

The mass pooling of all vehicles by the UOG administration and scooter travel to dairy farms around the Gondar city areas were unforgettable.
Flexibility in action- the breakdown of our rental van with five people from Ohio State and CDC on board that had a domino effect of triggering so many phone calls and cancellation of a Skype call on cancer partnership.

Thank you all for all the hard work by our OSU-Ethiopia One Health Task Force on both sides as well as our NIH East Africa partners from Kenya and Tanzania. Look forward for continued and sustained partnership.

Collecting samples from camels in the Awash Rift Valley

August 8 2014August 8, 2014

By Kelsey Gerbig
Veterinary Medicine student at Ohio State

Our summer research projects with Addis Ababa University took us to the Rift Valley in the Afar region of Ethiopia.

Kelsey and Giant Tortoise at Awash National Park

Kelsey Gerbig with a giant tortoise at the Awash National Park.

My focus is on Trypanosoma evansi and diagnostic techniques for practical and efficient identification of this blood parasite in camels.

Used for meat, milk and transportation, camels play an important role in the lives of the pastoralists in the Awash Rift Valley, and results from this project will provide an idea of the prevalence of this disease in camels in the Afar region.

Map credited to Kmusser, used under Creative Commons Attribution-Share Alike 3.0 Unported license

We left our hotel room early on Thursday to travel east to where the pastoralist tribe was currently living. The pastoralists are a nomadic people, who move with their animals to find grazing land and water throughout the year. On our way, we admired the gorgeous views.

The tribe that agreed to let us sample from their herd owned cattle, goats, and camels. We were quite taken aback at the size of their camel herd – close to 200!

We geared up to collect samples. Disposable gloves, shoe covers, and N95 respirators were donned. Even though we had limited contact with the camels, we wanted to take as many precautions as possible to avoid contracting zoonotic diseases.

Currently, it is fasting season for many in Ethiopia, and our helpers from the pastoralist tribe grew tired as the morning went on.

In the end, we were able to collect blood, feces, and respiratory secretions from 51 camels.

At the end of our work, I couldn’t resist taking out my digital camera to document our experiences that morning. As soon as I began snapping pictures, the kids started posing so that they could see themselves on the digital screen. Even some of the men joined in, posing with their weapons and camels!

We would like to say thank you to Dr. Nigatu Kebede and his laboratory technician, Nega Nigussie, for arranging our sampling trip and assisting with sample collection. Our summer research projects would not be possible without their help!

Counting dogs, with Gondar’s children helping us

June 20 2014June 19, 2014

By Ally Sterman, 2015 DVM and
Alexandra Medley, 2017 DVM and 2018 MPH/VPH
The Ohio State University

Our dog survey project takes us through various areas and communities in Gondar. Many of these areas are homes or rural communities that are heavily populated with families who have many children. As we walk around the areas, we quickly attract children. It is not common in many of these areas for individuals with white skin to pass through. When I was in Ethiopia the previous summer, in very, very rural communities children used to run and hide from us. This summer they run straight for us.

Often times we know they are coming for the screams of “you, you, you” or ” foreingee, foreingee.” Once they arrive, they begin to ask us our names, how we are and where we are from. Many will try to speak some English with us and others will suddenly become shy and run and hide. If you pull out a camera to take a picture, they also all hide but when we bring out the iPad to record data they become super interested in what we are doing. The brave ones come up and want to shake hands with us. Such a simple gesture brings a wide smile to their faces.

They have been very helpful, helping us identify what sex the dogs are, where they are and even bring them up to the front of the yards to help us see them better. In the suburban areas we had as many as 30 children following us and in the rural side entire small villages of children.

Interestingly, the local veterinarians have told us that the main breeding season is in the Ethiopian Spring (September by U.S. calendars), although we have seen many pregnant dogs and puppies. Despite our initial thought that each dog would be hard to tell apart, we have seen a variety of shapes, sizes, breeds and coat patterns. So far we have been able to casually determine that dogs are mostly found in the peri-urban, or housing, areas. Although dogs tend to remain in a small area, or territory, there are many friendly dogs that roam in groups.

We have seen many different medical conditions in the dogs, such as lameness, ticks, fleas, fighting wounds, and malnutrition, but none of this was outside of what we expected. We have completed our two rural paths, that are high up in the mountains where there are less than 15 houses per path. We have seen many dogs there, but more incredibly, the stunning panoramas of Gondar from up high. This season heralds strong winds and rain, and sometimes we had to brace ourselves from falling over as we navigated hilly terrain. In a few more days, we will wrap up our dog survey.

Thesis defenses and counting dogs in Gondar, the student perspective

June 16 2014June 16, 2014

By Ally Sterman, 2015 DVM and
Alexandra Medley, 2017 DVM and 2018 MPH/VPH
The Ohio State University

After a 13-hour flight, we arrived in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. A thought that kept crossing through both of our minds was whether or not our 140 pounds of veterinary medical supplies would make it to Ethiopia, through customs, and with us to Gondar. After locating the correct baggage claim lanes (this airport has 4), we waited patiently for our oversized and heavy baggage. Thankfully we made it with no difficulty through customs and to our airport.

Flights to Gondar leave early morning and we stayed overnight at the Jupiter hotel near the airport in Addis. The view from our room was of a large abandoned field. By day this field was a grazing zone for various sheep and goats, but by night it was a parking lot for local vehicles. After exploring around the area, we ended up calling it an early night.

We arrived to the airport early and upon arrival in Gondar were greeted by our partners from University of Gondar and taken to our hotel. Soon after settling in we headed to the vet school. We had the opportunity to listen to senior veterinary students defending their theses, which is the final project necessary to graduate. There are some striking differences between Ethiopia and U.S. vet school training. In Ethiopia the students defend a final thesis project instead of a cumulative boards exam (USA NAVLE), they attend school for 6 years (USA, 4), and primarily focus on large animal medicine because that is the primary need in the country.

After listening to the defenses we had a meeting with the faculty who helped us organize our dog survey. For the next week we are walking 15 different paths we have plotted through the city to count the roaming dog population and do a brief visual physical exam on each dog. Data we want to collect are the number of dogs seen along the path, sex, age, reproductive status, and any other clues to their health status.

Something we have learned already is how mountainous Gondar is, so although the paths are short, they take a while and we get a great workout. To get to destinations we take buses or taxis which are far more crowded than the average taxi in the US.

Taxis and busy city streets

We have seen many types of dogs so far, from a small Papillon cross to a large Mastiff. Our favorite dog is the mixed breed brown dog who resides directly outside our hotel, affectionately named Kino.

Kino, the dog

2014 One Health Summer Institute brochure posted online

May 28 2014

By Christine O’Malley
Executive Director of Health Sciences

I’m happy to share that the brochure for the 2014 One Health Summer Institute is now online.

More info about the institute can be found here: https://u.osu.edu/onehealth/projects/education/summer-institute/

Or you can download the brochure by clicking on this photo:

Ohio State in Ethiopia: Now the students’ work begins

July 3 2013

By Ally Sterman
Student, Ohio State College of Veterinary Medicine

With the start of the both the new week and new month our Ethiopia summer project really begins. Though we four students from various colleges at Ohio State arrived near the end of last week in Ethiopia, we did not begin our field work until July 1.

Our project takes us into both the rural and urban communities interviewing local adults, children, policy makers, community and faith leaders, as well as health care workers about rabies and dogs. We are set to travel around to three different areas before a workshop is held in Addis Ababa to discuss rabies further in mid-July.

However we do not go out alone. Each Ohio State student has two wonderful Ethiopian University of Gondar partners. These individuals are primarily faculty and staff at the university from a variety of fields/disciplines. They not only serve as interpreters for our project but tour guides of the city and historians for Ethiopia’s culture/traditions/history. They are quickly becoming lifelong and treasured friends. I know I can speak for all of the students about how grateful and appreciative we are for their help and how much fun/enjoyable they are making this experience.

The picture below was taken before one of the interviews conducted by my group. My group’s main focus is community leaders which include teachers, faith leaders, elders, and other various leaders in both the rural and urban settings. This picture was taken of one of the churches we travelled to in the city of Gondar where we had the opportunity to meet and talk to the priests about rabies and the dog population here in the city.

If generosity equaled power Ethiopia would control the world

July 2 2013

By Korbin Smith
Student, College of Medicine
School of Health and Rehabilitation Sciences

As we began our interviews with the locals I was amazed how easy it was to get people to volunteer. Everybody in this country wants to talk and help.

My group consisting of Dr. Atnaj Alebie and Tadele Atinafu have been more than helpful. They are brilliant professionals as well as very kind and humble people.

Together we were able to collect our first set of data in rural areas successfully and efficiently. Hearing what the rural adults and children believed caused rabies was truly incredible.

While many answers cause me to be concerned about their safety in an area where rabies is prevalent, it is inspiring to know that our work is needed.

Ohio State and Ethiopia: Building Collaborations

June 26 2013

Here I am reviewing some class materials with students in the “Food Safety and Food Borne Diseases” course, as part of the Summer One Health Institute.

by Bayleyegn Molla, DVM, PhD
Clinical Assistant Professor and International Programs Coordinator
Ohio State College of Veterinary Medicine

Our hope is to establish ongoing collaborative relationships–not just during the One Health Summer Institute, but well in to the future. We hope to be able to build a mutually beneficial partnership between faculty and students at Ohio State and University of Gondar, which will help leverage expertise and open opportunities for all.

For participants from Ethiopia, this experience can bring the world-class knowledge and expertise of Ohio State to address important public health problems, though training and ongoing working relationships. Partners at the University of Gondar bring a wealth of knowledge about local priorities and infrastructure.

Research and practice priorities are well organized in thematic areas with an emphasis on team-based research.

For faculty from Ohio State, this partnership offers the opportunity to explore and help develop solutions to tropical diseases, wildlife and environmental issues, and to apply new approaches in a different culture and region. This opportunity helps expand the capabilities for students trained through the University of Gondar and faculty to use this knowledge to address important issues in Ohio, in our country, and throughout the world.

It is very rewarding to see this partnership in action in the One Health Summer Institute. Students and faculty from nursing, public health, veterinary medicine, basic sciences, and human medicine have been discussing important problems such:

Food-borne illnesses
MRSA prevention
Cervical cancer
Zoonotic diseases

More importantly, these workshops explore potential ways to work together in the coming months and years.

The “One Health” framework is an excellent foundation on which to build this partnership, because it relies on contributions from a range of scientific experts and the active engagement of students in workshop sessions.

Being from Ethiopia originally, and now as a faculty member at Ohio State, it is tremendously rewarding to see the engagement of both universities in an effort to improve health.