One health, from your backyard to the global village

In the backyard, on the farm, at the veterinary clinic—humans, animals, and environments everywhere interact to share one health.

The One Health Initiative has promoted this one-health concept for several years. Now the One Health Commission has been launched to help address, more directly, interdisciplinary health issues in the United States and throughout the global village.

On June 29, the commission incorporated as a nonprofit organization. Its main mission is to increase cooperation among health professions and other groups to prevent and treat zoonotic diseases and other medical conditions common to humans and animals.

Dr. Roger K. Mahr proposed the One Health Initiative in July 2006 when he took office as AVMA president.

“It’s been very rewarding to see the collaborative effort that has involved many individuals and many entities to bring the One Health Initiative through these past three years to the current point of establishing the One Health Commission,” said Dr. Mahr, who has been serving as project director and will serve as the commission’s interim CEO.

Along with the AVMA, the American Medical Association and American Society of Microbiology have been among the strong supporters of the One Health Initiative.

“The development of the national commission is an important collaboration between human medicine, veterinary medicine, and environmental medicine—plus the additional support of microbiology, which covers across these disciplines,” said Albert Osbahr III, MD, the AMA representative to the commission.

The goals of the commission include creating an integrated strategy to improve public health and expanding awareness of the one-health concept. The commission also plans to illustrate the value of the one-health concept through demonstration projects and to engage the international community to improve global health.

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