Serge Morand

From SARS to avian influenza, Ebola virus and MERS-CoV, infectious diseases have received increasing attention in recent decades from scientists, risk managers, the media and the general public. What explains the constant emergence of infectious diseases? What are the related challenges? In five chapters, experts from different scientific fields analyse the ecological, social, institutional and political dynamics associated with emerging infectious diseases. This book discusses how the concepts, scientific results and action plans of international or governmental organizations are constructed and coordinated. In clear straightforward language, this book explores the continuities and discontinuities that occur with emerging infectious diseases, both in terms of collective action and in our relationship to the biological world.

There is a gap between the ecology of health and the concepts supported by international initiatives such as EcoHealth, One Health or Planetary Health; a gap which this book aims to fill. Global change is accelerated by problems of growing population, industrialization and geopolitics, and the world’s biodiversity is suffering as a result, which impacts both humans and animals. However, Biodiversity and Health offers the unique opportunity to demonstrate how ecological, environmental, medical and social sciences can contribute to the improvement of human health and wellbeing through the conservation of biodiversity and the services it brings to societies. This book gives an expansive and integrated overview of the scientific disciplines that contribute to the connection between health and biodiversity, from the evolutionary ecology of infectious and non-infectious diseases to ethics, law and politics.

This comprehensive, groundbreaking book on the biodiversity of parasites offers a clear and accessible explanation of how parasite biodiversity provides insight into the history and biogeography of other organisms, the structure of ecosystems, and the processes that lead to the diversification of life.