Advantages and Future Areas of Importance of the One Health Approach in the Control of Bovine and Zoonotic TB

The overall advantage of an integrated One Health approach to solving the problems of BTB and zTB will be the optimization of monitoring and surveillance systems to assess the overall burden of TB in animals and humans in Africa (Kaneene et al.

As we move along this new roadmap toward tackling BTB and zTB, further research areas that involve methods to control M. bovis must be proposed and pursued. This should include the disciplines of sociology (risk perception and hygiene), economics (the cost for the community and disability-adjusted life years—DALYs), and ecology (movement of animals and contact networks between species) (Roger 2012). As a follow-up to this, there is a need to form a coalition of experts within each country, and throughout the continent as a whole, in cooperation with other key stakeholders, to promote constant monitoring and surveillance, to gather comprehensive data at all epidemiological sites (pastoralist settings, livestock markets, abattoirs, hospitals/laboratories), and to work toward the reduction and control of the disease in animal and human populations. More importantly, this range of activities will ultimately inform the level of funding that will be required to support long-term goals at the community, state, and national levels in affected African countries.

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