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When it comes to environmental issues, solutions are multifold. Much like the interplay between organ systems within our body, how humans interact with other organisms has a profound impact on the earth and its inhabitants. Addressing the challenges at the “intersection of humans, animals, and the environment” is Tufts OneHealth, a group of researchers within the Tufts Clinical and Translational Science Institute dedicated towards diversifying responses from the scientific community to issues that affect people and animals alike. Addressing everything from shared cancers to areas of improvement within the American healthcare system, Tufts OneHealth reaches across institutional lines to create one of the most comprehensive overviews of universal health issues.
Now, this group is sharing their knowledge with Tufts undergraduates through a new ExCollege course, One Health: Animal, Human, and Environmental Connections – spearheaded by Tufts Provost and Senior Vice President ad interim, Dr. Deborah Kochevar (DVM, PhD, DACVCP), and Research Assistant Professor at Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University Dr. Deborah Linder (DVM, DACVN). The course takes a multifaceted approach to global healthcare, pulling in faculty expertise from across the university’s campuses, including: the Tufts dental school, medical school, veterinary school, nutrition center, and environmental studies program. One such visitor is Dr. John Castellot, an associate director of the OneHealth program and long-standing faculty member of the Sackler School of Graduate Biomedical Sciences. He frequently attends lessons, and has taught from time to time.
When I joined the class, they were discussing the latest findings in human-animal interaction studies, Dr. Linder’s field of research. But rather than let herself take over, Dr. Linder pauses the lecture for a breakout session so that students can experience the very collaboration behind the studies that they have been reading. This collaboration is essential, for the class itself is quite diverse. Far from catering solely to natural science majors, the course is comprised of numerous liberal arts students, including majors in Economics and International Relations, as well as in English and Drama.
To Dr. Castellot, this intermingling is crucial: such diversity keeps the course “challenging for the science majors, but not overwhelming for the non-science majors, which allows for a focus on the bigger issues.”
In simply a few short weeks, One Health has already covered topics ranging from popular zoonotic diseases to issues in service animal regulation. Despite the novelty of the subjects, Dr. Castellot was quick to highlight that “students seem to be enjoying it so far.” Kevin Sung, a senior majoring in International Relations with a focus in global health, agreed: “There is a lot of anecdotal evidence about how animals better human health...I like how this course tests [the findings from] those studies.” He was also surprised at the broad scope of the course, enjoying how it explored both the “foreign policy as well as the domestic.”
Kevin is not alone in his skepticism towards human animal interaction studies—Dr. Linder ends the class with a ringing question: “What do we still need to know?” It is an important question to ask, when many researchers have missed the mark in human interaction studies by asking whether pets are good for us, rather than correctly asking for whom pet ownership would be beneficial. As Dr. Linder emphatically suggests, researchers need to “stop hanging in academic silos!”—only then will we find the answers to far-reaching questions on environmental stability.
About the Author
Emma Hodgdon is a senior studying English literature. Apart from reading Gothic fiction, she can be found practicing cello for the Symphony and Chamber Orchestras, or dancing with the university’s ballroom dance team. She spends her free time experimenting with calligraphy, learning to speak Chinese, and caring for her succulents, Verotchka and Geraldine.
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