KOCHI: When dichloro-diphenyl-trichloroethane (DDT) was sprayed to tackle malaria outbreaks, the immediate target were the mosquitoes that carried the disease. What followed, however, was a cascade of unintended consequences: birds that fed on mosquitoes disappeared, food chains collapsed, rodent populations rose, and the chemical slowly accumulated in human bodies through air and water.
The episode is often cited as a lesson in what happens when human health is addressed in isolation from animal/bird life, and the environment. It is precisely this thinking that underpins the ‘One Health’ approach now being explored for Kerala’s wetlands.
“One Health is based on a simple idea that human, animal and environmental health are interconnected. Managing one requires inputs from the others,” said Dr Rajeev Raghavan, assistant professor at the Kerala University of Fisheries & Ocean Studies (Kufos) and part of the team steering the programme. The approach is particularly relevant to wetlands, he said.
Kuttanad and the Vembanad Lake face mosquito-borne diseases, water-borne infections and animal diseases such as bird flu. “They all emerge from the same ecological space, but are currently managed separately by different departments,” Dr Rajeev highlighted.
One Health, he said, is attempting to address this fragmentation by piloting a framework for wetland monitoring and management.
While wetlands in India have the Ramsar classification (which identifies them to be of global importance), the labelling does not carry any legal binding, researchers said. This means the management and enforcement of wetlands fall on state agencies, which are often constrained by limited manpower.
“However, the two-year project’s focus is not on immediate conservation or disease-control interventions, but on building capacity,” stressed Dr Rajeev, who is also the South Asia chair and Red List coordinator of IUCN Species Survival Commission. This capacity building involves specific tools and techniques, and enables the flow of data and decision-making across concerned sectors, Dr Rajeev said.
As part of the programme, a six-day technical workshop was held in Kochi, training 35 participants from three countries and 12 Indian states. “The training brought together tools from disease biology, ecology and social sciences, emphasising how actions in which domain affect outcome in another,” said Maarten P M Vanhove, assistant professor of Hasselt University in Belgium.
A workshop was also conducted in Thiruvananthapuram under the aegis of the State Wetland Authority Kerala. “Here, we came into an agreement that the framework could begin with a smaller, manageable wetland. And Vellayani Lake was identified as a pilot site,” Dr Rajeev said.
The project, funded by the Belgian government, involves universities from Belgium, Kufos, the University of Washington in the United States, and the University of Lubumbashi in Congo, alongside Indian academic and policy institutions.