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. 2021 Feb:214:105780.
doi: 10.1016/j.actatropica.2020.105780. Epub 2020 Nov 28.

Tackling zoonoses in a crowded world: Lessons to be learned from the COVID-19 pandemic

Alex Córdoba-Aguilar  1 , Carlos N Ibarra-Cerdeña  2 , Iván Castro-Arellano  3 , Gerardo Suzan  4
Affiliations

Tackling zoonoses in a crowded world: Lessons to be learned from the COVID-19 pandemic

Alex Córdoba-Aguilar et al. Acta Trop. 2021 Feb.

Abstract

The COVID-19 zoonosis is bringing about a number of lessons to humanity. One is that of transforming our links with nature and, particularly, wildlife given the likely COVID-19 origin from illegal wildlife trading. Similar to vector borne diseases (VBD, diseases transmitted by vectors), the COVID-19 pandemic follows related patterns (e.g. no effective or available vaccines, difficult to diagnose, highly localized infection geographical foci, non-human reservoirs) for which we urgently need preventive measures. Towards this aim, governments worldwide must strive to prevent further devastation of natural environments that serve as buffer areas to humans against zoonotic agents (among other health risks), protecting biodiversity and its concomitant causes (e.g. global change), and banning use of wildlife of illegal origin. We herein state that some VBD prevention strategies could also be applied to zoonotic disease prevention, including COVID-19 or any type likely to be related to environmental conditions. The occurrence of future pandemic occurrence will depend on whether governments embrace these aims now.

Keywords: Emerging zoonotic epidemics; Global warming; Government; Health policy; One Health; Vector-borne diseases.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare that they have no known competing financial interests or personal relationships that could have appeared to influence the work reported in this paper.

The authors declare the following financial interests/personal relationships which may be considered as potential competing interests:

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