One Health approach successfully uses laboratory-based surveillance of Brucellosis in Jordan

EMPHNET
Jun 15, 2022


Using the One Health approach to engage stakeholders from the human and animal health sectors, GHD|EMPHNET is strengthening the diagnosis and prevention of brucellosis, a highly prevalent zoonotic disease posing a potential biothreat in the region.

 In Jordan, EMPHNET along with the ministries of health and agriculture, as well as the Royal Medical Services, established active, laboratory-based surveillance of human and animal brucellosis using appropriate confirmatory testing in accordance with the standards of the World Health Organization and the World Organization for Animal Health. They worked in three endemic areas: East Amman, Karak, and Mafraq.

 For over three years, the project’s implementers invested heavily in training clinicians and veterinarians in case definition, clinical signs and symptoms, modes of transmission, and treatment.  They also trained public health and veterinary laboratory workers on relevant diagnostics: Rose Bengal, Serum Agglutination Test, ELISA, which they introduced, fluorescence polarization assay, and PCR. One Health was taken a step further, as new communication protocols were established and adopted to enhance communication channels between field and laboratories and between animal and human health sectors.