Strengthening preparedness against global health threats: A paradigm shift based on One Health approaches.

The implementation of preparedness strategies to prevent and mitigate the impact of global health threats poses several challenges. It should promptly identify cross-cutting drivers of pandemic threats, assess context-specific risks, engage multiple stakeholders, and translate complex data from multiple sources into accessible information for action. This requires a coordinated, multidisciplinary and multisectoral effort engaging systems that, most of the time, work in isolation. The One Health (OH) approach promotes the collaboration and communication among different disciplines and sectors, and could be applied across the preparedness phases at national and international level. We discuss here gaps and needs in preparedness strategies, which can benefit from the OH approach, and a set of actionable recommendations, as shared with the G20-2021 with a dedicated Policy Brief. The discussion adds to the current debate about OH operationalization and promotes a paradigm shift towards coordinated prevention and preparedness strategies for early assessment and management of global health threats.

Diatoms in drowning cases in forensic veterinary context: a preliminary study.

In this preliminary study, a digestive method used in forensic context to extract diatoms has been applied in organs taken from ten wildlife animals belonging three species of mammals (a deer, a roe and five otters) and one species of birds (two magpies). Only four carcasses were recovered from aquatic environments (bath trough for animals, bathtub irrigation, river) and only in three cases out of ten that the cause of death was ruled out as drowning. In seven cases, the death was due to other causes: gunshot injuries for one otter, blunt trauma for a magpie, and traumatic injuries followed by motor vehicle collision in other four otters and a roe. Post-mortem examination was performed in all carcasses. The diatom test protocol was performed according to the Italian guidelines for analysis of benthic diatoms for ecological status assessment of inland waters. Five grams of lung, liver, and kidney was taken from all the animal carcasses. In some cases, additional tissue samples were also available among which brain, heart, spleen, and bone marrow. In all four cases found in water, the drowning medium was also available. Hydrogen peroxide (H2O2) digestion was performed, and identification of 21 genera of diatoms was obtained. The method proved to be suitable for the identification of diatoms in the organs of the animals drowned supporting the final diagnosis of drowning. Only in otters, all died for causes other than drowning, diatoms did not prove to be suitable for the diagnosis of drowning since their presence in the internal organs was mainly related to their main diet based on fishmeal. The authors believe that this first trial is very promising, and the results suggest that diatom test can be easily applied in forensic veterinary context.

Least Disturbed Condition for European Mediterranean rivers.

The present report describes a three-step approach that was used to characterize and define thresholds for the Least Disturbed Condition in Mediterranean streams of four different types, regarding organic pollution and nutrients, hydrological and morphological alterations, and land use. For this purpose, a common database composed of national reference sites (929 records) from seven countries, sampled for invertebrates, diatoms and macrophytes was used. The analyses of reference sites showed that small (catchment <100 km(2)) siliceous and non-siliceous streams were mainly affected by channelization, bank alteration and hydropeaking. Medium-sized siliceous rivers were the most affected by stressors: 25-43% of the samples showed at least slight alterations regarding channelization, connectivity, upstream dam influence, hydropeaking and degradation of riparian vegetation. Temporary streams were the least affected by hydromorphological changes, but they were nevertheless affected by alterations in riparian vegetation. There were no major differences between all permanent stream types regarding water quality, but temporary streams showed lower values for oxygenation (DO) and wider ranges for other variables, such as nitrates. A lower threshold value for DO (60%) was determined for this stream type and can be attributed to the streams' natural characteristics. For all other river types, common limits were found for the remaining variables (ammonium, nitrate, phosphate, total P, % of artificial areas, % of intensive and extensive agriculture, % of semi-natural areas in the catchment). These values were then used to select the list of reference sites. The biological communities were characterized, revealing the existence of nine groups of Mediterranean invertebrate communities, six for diatoms and five for macrophytes: each group was characterized by specific indicator taxa that highlighted the differences between groups.