Leveraging ecosystem restoration for zoonotic spillover risk mitigation

As disease regulation is a key ecosystem service, it is crucial that we better understand the role that restoring landscapes can play in reducing disease risks. Ongoing One Health studies suggest that declining biodiversity and increasing zoonotic pathogen spill-over risk are linked. Restoration processes normally aim at increasing species diversity, wherefore it is assumed that pathogens will be diluted in restored ecosystems, hence reducing the risk of zoonotic spillover. Nonetheless, the developing species composition during restorative processes will impact dilution-amplification effects. To estimate the threshold beyond which a restored ecosystem can be considered to have reached the pathogen dilution phase, it is crucial to characterise the communities of hosts, and the prevalence of pathogens, at the different stages of recovery of an ecosystem. Using interdisciplinary methods, this project has the dual aim of examining the amplification-dilution of zoonotic pathogens in a mangrove forest of the western Peninsular Malaysia, and to estimate the frequency and duration of exposure of local communities to this hazard, so as to best mitigate the risk of zoonotic pathogen spillover.

EN, Open Access, PDF available, Abstract of an Oral Presentation or a Poster