Human and animal health surveys among pastoralists

Abstract

Valid human and livestock health surveys, including longitudinal follow-up, are feasible among mobile pastoralists and provide fundamental information to agencies for interventions that are responsive to realities and effective in addressing the needs of pastoralists. However, pastoralists are often excluded from studies, surveillance systems and health programmes. The occurrence of preventable and treatable diseases such as perinatal tetanus, measles and tuberculosis are indicative of limited access to health providers and information. It is difficult for health services to include effective outreach with their available financial and human resources. One consequence is that maternal mortality rates among pastoralists are unacceptably high. Environmental determinants such as the quality of water and the pasture ecosystems further influence the morbidity of pastoralists. In the Sahel, the nutritional status of pastoralist children is seasonally better than that of settled children; but pastoralist women tend to have higher acute malnutrition rates. Pastoralist women are more vulnerable than men to exclusion from health services for different context-specific reasons. Evidence-based control measures can be assessed in cluster surveys with simultaneous assessments of health among people and livestock, where data on costs of disease and interventions are also collected. These provide important arguments for governmental and non-governmental agencies for intervention development. New, integrated One Health surveillance systems making use of mobile technology and taking into account local concepts and the experiences and priorities of pastoralist communities, combined with sound field data, are essential to develop and provide adapted human and animal health services that are inclusive for mobile pastoralist communities and allow them to maintain their mobile way of life.

Knowledge and practices surrounding zoonotic disease among Mongolian herding households

“…The report also found that 89.9% of the rural households bring their drinking water into the home from outside sources compared to 44.5% of the urban households (National Statistialc Office of Mongolia 2016). Runoff from animal and human waste can Barnes et al 2017;Schelling et al 2016;Karthe et al 2017). Consuming water from an unimproved source can expose a person to many types of infectious agents and even toxic chemical contaminants (Uddin et al 2014;Prüss-Ustün et al 2014;Schelling et al 2016).…”

“…Runoff from animal and human waste can Barnes et al 2017;Schelling et al 2016;Karthe et al 2017). Consuming water from an unimproved source can expose a person to many types of infectious agents and even toxic chemical contaminants (Uddin et al 2014;Prüss-Ustün et al 2014;Schelling et al 2016). And while there is insufficient information on overall Mongolian water quality and safety, particularly among rural communities, previous research among herding households found that almost 40% of those who drank from unimproved water sources did not treat the water prior to use (National Statistical Office of Mongolia 2015; Karthe et al 2017).…”

“…Intensive herding practices over the last several decades coupled with climate change drivers has led to desertification, land degradation, and an increase in natural disasters such as drought, windstorms, heavy snowfall as well as extreme temperature fluctuations (Batzukh et al 2012;Bedunah and Schmidt 2004;Reid et al 2014). The increasing necessity of moving livestock to better grazing pastures and water sources throughout the seasons and across larger areas means that herding households of Mongolia are often located far from city centres and other development infrastructure such as running water, municipal power grids, sewage systems, supermarkets, schools, veterinarians and health care facilities (Bold 1996;Benwell 2006;Mocellin and Foggin 2008;Schelling et al 2016;Sack et al 2018). The hardships faced by herders has led to a slow and steady rural-to-urban migration of youth in search of more opportunities in education, training, and employment (Batzukh et al 2012).…”

“…Since pastoralist communities are often excluded from large health surveys globally, it is difficult to truly assess the current zoonotic disease burden among rural nomadic humans, animals, and their environment (Schelling et al 2016;Zinsstag et al 2016c). Still, previous research has shown an increased prevalence of zoonotic disease among herder families in Mongolia (Mocellin and Foggin 2008).…”

The future of pastoralism: an introduction

“…Cross-border animal disease control in pastoral areas also contributes to conflict transformation. Good quality human and animal health surveys are feasible among pastoralists but are still not commonly done, as shown by Esther Schelling et al (43). Jakob Zinsstag et al (44) argue that costeffective control strategies are needed to improve animal health, and Fayiz Abakar et al (45) outline the potential for collaborative provision of veterinary and public health services for pastoralists.…”