One Health Stakeholders at the Ceremony

The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO),through it Emergency Centre for Transboundary Animal Diseases (ECTAD), in Sierra Leone celebrated the National One Health Day on 7 November 2024 with a theme centered on “One Health in Communities”, highlighting the importance of engaging local communities in the One Health approach to tackling shared health threats and risks and promoting well-being. Participants included representatives from different sectors, Ministries, Development Agencies, including Ministry of Health, Ministry of Agriculture and Food Security (MAFS), Ministry of Environment and Climate Change (MoECC) and Ministry of Water Resources and Sanitation (MoWRS), Office of the National Security (ONS), National Disaster Management Agency (NDMA), One Health Partners, Traditional healers and civil society, among others, attended the celebrations.

Speaking during the celebrations, the Deputy Minister of Health, Professor Charles Senesie, emphasized the importance of grassroots healthcare “Having One Health in communities is the way to go to empower our communities” the Minister said. This community-based approach, allows primary healthcare to become the first line of defense for the people". he noted

Dr. Theresa Dick, Deputy Minister of Agriculture and Food Security highlighted the importance of collaboration in combating zoonotic diseases, considering that 70 percent of the emerging infectious diseases originate from animals and 60 percent of the existing infectious diseases are zoonotic. “There is no individual sector that can manage alone because of the interconnectedness,” she stated.

Randy Kolstad,United States Agency for International Development (USAID) Country Representative in Sierra Leone stressed the urgency of environmental drivers in disease spread “A single disease can become a pandemic and infect many people in a short time as the case of COVID-19 pandemic leading to severe consequences to all of us” he noted. USAID is investing over $10 million united state dollars annually to support community-level disease prevention, detection, and response in Sierra Leone.

Dr. Rene Bessin, FAO ECTAD Team Leader highlighted the organization’s support through One Health initiatives, including the development of the Animal Diseases Bill, Animal Welfare and Protection Bill and the One Health Biosafety and Biosecurity Strategy among others. FAO, the World Health Organization (WHO), and other partners continue to strengthen Sierra Leone's health infrastructure to prevent zoonotic outbreaks.

Since adopting the One Health approach in 2017, Sierra Leone has made strides in health preparedness. WHO's TUCKER, Medlin Soko, noted successes such as the formation of Rapid Response Teams and strengthened disease surveillance. Sierra Leone recently demonstrated regional leadership by deploying 20 medical personnel to Rwanda to combat the Marburg virus outbreak.

One Health Coordinator, Joseph Anderson Bunting-Graden, celebrated the platform’s achievements, including the validation of a National One Health Strategic Plan and the establishment of cross-sectoral communication protocols. “Our One Health Platform is a regional success story,” he stated, attributing the progress to a fully integrated multisectoral strategy born from lessons of the Ebola outbreak, in 2017, as 11,316 human lives were lost in Sierra Leone, Guinea and Liberia.

National One Health Day, observed annually on 3 November, fosters collaboration across health, animal, and ecosystem sectors, highlighting the interconnectedness essential for resilient public health systems.