The health of people, animals, plants, and the environment are deeply connected. Threats like pandemics, antimicrobial resistance, and food crises cannot be solved by any one field working alone. One Health is the integrated approach that makes real solutions possible.
Human medicine, veterinary science, and environmental science have long been treated as separate fields — each with its own institutions, budgets, and solutions. But many of today's most serious health threats don't fit neatly into any one of these boxes.
When a new virus jumps from animals to humans, it's a veterinary problem and a public health problem at the same time. When antibiotic overuse in livestock farming contributes to drug-resistant infections in people, it's an agricultural problem and a medical one. When deforestation brings wildlife into closer contact with human settlements, it's an environmental problem — and a disease risk. These connections are not exceptions. They are the rule.
One Health is the recognition of this reality. It is an approach that brings together human medicine, veterinary science, plant health, environmental science — and crucially, social sciences and humanities, because understanding how people and communities behave is just as important as understanding pathogens. No single discipline can address these challenges alone. It requires collaboration across sectors, borders, and scientific communities.
COVID-19 made the cost of ignoring these connections undeniable. In its wake, the EU has acknowledged the need for more integrated approaches — through its Scientific Opinion on One Health Governance, the Choose Europe for Life Sciences strategy, and new investment frameworks like HERA and the Preparedness Union Strategy adopted in 2025. The direction is clear: the future of health security is integrated, or it is inadequate.
At the One Health Centre, this is not an abstract principle. It is how we work every day.