How political, cultural, and economic forces can shape the risk of zoonotic disease

In eastern Ethiopia, pressures like conflict and displacement are changing how people and their camels travel, shifting livestock into new environments and potentially influencing the risk of zoonotic diseases spreading between animals and humans. 

A new study co-led by George Mason University infectious disease expert Amira Roess explores these connections as part of a broader look at how politics, culture, economics, and international trade factor into zoonotic disease risk in livestock-herding communities. Published in Social Science & Medicine, the research is part of a long-running international collaboration funded in part by a $2.5 million National Science Foundation grant, for which Roess is principal investigator. 

For this paper, researchers interviewed more than 100 people involved in camel herding, care, milking, trading, and slaughter across eastern Ethiopia. They identified several factors that could affect zoonotic disease risk: 

• People and camels often live in close proximity, and grazing camels can come into contact with other wildlife. 
• Raw camel milk is widely consumed fresh and unpasteurized. 
• Conflict and displacement can push people and livestock onto new routes and into wildlife preserves, changing where they encounter other animals. 
• Trade restrictions and challenges accessing export facilities can push more activity into informal markets outside of disease surveillance systems. 

Because diseases that spread between animals and humans account for most emerging infectious diseases, the researchers emphasize the importance of a “One Health” approach, which considers human, animal, and environmental health together. 

“When we think about diseases moving between animals and people, we tend to focus on the pathogen or the animal carrying it. This study shows why we also need to understand the broader and more complex circumstances that affect how people and animals interact,” said Roess, professor of global health and epidemiology in the Department of Global and Community Health at the College of Public Health. 

Read the full study here.