Up to 75% of emerging infectious diseases in humans are zoonotic in nature, impacting the health of both humans and animals. In addition to spillover from animals to humans directly, many of these infectious agents are transmitted to mammals via arthropods and are thus designated as ‘vector-borne’. Vector-borne infectious agents cause more than 17% of all infectious diseases and more than 700,000 deaths annually. Vector-borne and zoonotic diseases (VB&ZDs) include some of the most devastating infectious diseases in modern history, including malaria, dengue fever, yellow fever, Zika fever, East coast fever, and African trypanosomiasis. Unfortunately, low and middle-income countries, particularly those within the tropics, have typically endured the greatest burden of these diseases. Besides humans, many of these diseases also affect the health of animals and thus adversely impact the health and economic well-being of millions of people living in these regions. Land use change, deforestation, and intensification of livestock and agricultural production systems stand to increase human encounter rates with wildlife and their pathogens. Moreover, encroachment of people and their domestic animals into wildlife and arthropod vector habitats could result in spillovers that fuel the emergence and spread of VB&ZDs. At the same time, the environmental and ecological perturbations we are facing pose new challenges for predicting and combatting these complicated and multifactorial diseases. Hence, advances and sustainable control of these diseases will require a multi-disciplinary ‘One Health’ strategy with a paradigm shift in the way scientists traditionally approach problems. Interdisciplinary approaches that take advantage of cutting-edge research from different scientific disciplines is needed for development of innovative solutions and applications.
The Yale VB&ZD Network brings together diverse faculty members on our campus to advance collaborative and interdisciplinary research under the YIGH Faculty Network Program. The Yale VB&ZD Network currently includes members from the Yale Schools of Medicine, Public Health, and Engineering and Applied Science, as well as the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at Yale College. Members of the network are engaged in basic and translational research and public health practice. The Network faculty are committed to training the workforce for the local and global community to prevent the emergence and manage the control of these infections. The network welcomes new faculty members from across Yale and participation from individuals at any stage in their training and career.
If interested in learning more about this new Network, please contact Dr. Serap Aksoy (serap.aksoy@yale.edu), Dr. Brian Weiss (brian.weiss@yale.edu) or Dr. Chantal Vogels (chantal.vogels@yale.edu), Yale VB&ZD Network Leads. If you have any questions or inquiries about the YIGH Faculty Network Program, please email Dr. Jeremy Schwartz (jeremy.schwartz@yale.edu), Program Lead.