Invited Speaker Australian Society for Microbiology Annual Scientific Meeting 2023

From Dirt to Disease: Unpacking the Impacts of Environments on Human Health in Low-Middle Income Countries through a One Health Lens (93973)

Rebekah Henry 1 , Audrie Lin 2 , S. Fiona Barker 1 , Ruzka Taruc 3 , Autiko Tella 4 , Andi Zulkifli 3 , Jannifer Fillipe 4 , Maghfira Saifuddaolah 3 , Silvia Rosova Vilsoni 4 , Revoni Vamosi 4 , Rachael Lappan 5 , Chris Greening 5 , Stephen Luby 6 , David McCarthy 7 , Karin Leder 1
  1. School of Public Health and Preventive Medicine, Monash University, Clayton, VIC, Australia
  2. College of Health and Human Development, The Pennsylvania State University, University Park, PA
  3. Universitas Hasanuddin, Kota Makassar, Sulawesi Selatan
  4. Fiji National University, Samabula, Suva, Fiji
  5. Department of Microbiology, Monash University, Clayton, Victoria
  6. Department of Medicine, Stanford University, Stanford, California
  7. Queensland University Technology, Brisbane, Queensland

Human, animal and environmental health are becoming increasingly interconnected particularly in resource constrained settings. An estimated 1 billion people worldwide live in informal settlements, generally characterised by their lack of access to basic services such as clean water, sanitation and health services. Consequently, enteric diseases are a significant public health concern in these low-income, high-density settings. Non-diarrhoeal pathogens such as helminths also contribute to the disease burden and malnutrition. This interconnectedness of humans, animals, and their environment requires a holistic One Health approach to understand pathogen carriage, survival and transmission pathways.

The Revitalising Informal Settlements and their Environments (RISE) programme is a transdisciplinary research program and randomized controlled trial in urban informal settlements of Fiji and Indonesia. To assess the extent of enteropathogen abundance within informal settlements, methods that can monitor several genera in a range of sample types are needed. TaqMan array card (TAC) technology represents one approach that has been successfully applied for the identification and semi-quantitation of enteric pathogens from human and environmental samples (water, soil, animal faeces).  The RISE project teams have analysed over 1000 samples, representing one full program year (2019-2020) to start to understand seasonal variation across human, animal, and environments.

The results revealed notable differences in pathogen presence and abundance between Indonesia and Fiji. In Fijian samples, a total of 30 microbes overlapped between humans, animals, and environments, while in Indonesia, only 15 were observed, with distinct pathways of contamination (such as human-water and animal-soil) identified. This high degree of cross-connectivity in Fiji indicates that constant faecal contamination and close contact between humans, animals, and their environment may result in a consistent cycle of illness beyond anticipated seasonal trends. This study highlights the importance of establishing baseline pathogen data, within a One Health framework, before implementing targeted mitigation strategies such as those applied in water and sanitation programs.