Strategies for Implementing a One Welfare Framework into Emergency Management

Responding to emergencies requires many different individuals and organisations to work well together under extraordinary circumstances. Unfortunately, the management of animal welfare in emergencies remains largely disconnected from emergency management overall. This is due predominately to profess...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Animals (Basel) 2021-11, Vol.11 (11), p.3141
Main Authors: Squance, Hayley, MacDonald, Carol, Stewart, Carol, Prasanna, Raj, Johnston, David M
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Animal welfare
Animals
animals in disasters
Collaboration
Communication
Decision making
Emergencies
Emergency management
Emergency preparedness
Emergency response
implementation
Interdisciplinary aspects
Legislation
One Welfare
Public safety
Social environment
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Summary:Responding to emergencies requires many different individuals and organisations to work well together under extraordinary circumstances. Unfortunately, the management of animal welfare in emergencies remains largely disconnected from emergency management overall. This is due predominately to professional silos and a failure to understand the importance of human–animal-environment (h-a-e) interdependencies. One Welfare (OW) is a concept with these interrelationships at its core. This paper argues that by adopting an OW framework it will be possible to achieve a transdisciplinary approach to emergency management in which all stakeholders acknowledge the importance of the h-a-e interdependencies and work to implement a framework to support this. Acknowledging that such a transformational change will not be easy, this paper proposes several strategies to overcome the challenges and optimise the outcomes for animal welfare emergency management (AWEM). These include legislation and policy changes including h-a-e interface interactions as business as usual, improving knowledge through interprofessional education and training, incorporating One Welfare champions, and recognising the role of animals as vital conduits into communities.
ISSN:2076-2615
2076-2615
DOI:10.3390/ani11113141