Assessing One Health capacities for transboundary zoonotic diseases at the Libya-Tunisia border.

Background: The dynamic nature of zoonotic emergence, spillover and spread necessitates multisectoral coordination beyond national borders to encompass cross-boundary and regional cooperation. Designated points of entry (POEs), specifically ground crossings, serve as critical locales for establishing and maintaining robust prevention, detection, notification, coordination, and response mechanisms to transboundary emerging and re-emerging disease threats. In order to better assess One Health capacities for transboundary zoonotic diseases (TZD) prevention, detection and response we adapted an existing tool, One Health Systems Assessment for Priority Zoonoses (OHSAPZ), for a cross-border, POE setting in North Africa.

Using One Health assessments to leverage endemic disease frameworks for emerging zoonotic disease threats in Libya.

Continued emergence, re-emergence and spread of zoonotic diseases demonstrates the imperative need for multisectoral communication and joint coordination of disease detection and response. While there are existing international frameworks underpinning One Health capacity building for pandemic prevention and response, often guidance does not account for challenges faced by countries undergoing long-term conflict and sociopolitical instability. The purpose of this research was to identify Libya's laboratory and surveillance networks and routes of inter- and multisectoral communication and coordination for priority zoonotic diseases.

Evidence of ongoing brucellosis in livestock animals in North West Libya.

Animal brucellosis is thought to be present in small ruminants, cattle, and camels in Libya, particularly in the west coastal strip. Before the system collapsed due to political unrest in 2011, prevalence of the disease did not exceed 0.2% in cattle, 0.

Characterization of Avian Influenza and Newcastle Disease Viruses from Poultry in Libya.

On March 2013, the Libyan poultry industry faced severe outbreaks due to mixed infections of APMV-1 (Newcastle disease) and low pathogenic avian influenza (AI) of the H9N2 subtype which were causing high mortality and great economic losses. APMV-1 and H9N2 were isolated and characterized. Genetic sequencing of the APMV-1/chicken/Libya/13VIR/ 7225-1/2013 isolate revealed the presence of a velogenic APMV-1 belonging to lineage 5 (GRRRQKR*F Lin.