Kajiado adopts One Health Care approach to enhance public health surveillance

Health CEC Kajiado Alex Kilouwa and Speaker of the County Assembly Justus Ng’ossor speaking after a three-day training of MCAs on One Health approach at Rongai, Kajiado County.

Kajiado County will soon be rolling out One Health Care Approach Strategic Plan 2025-2030.

One Health approach addresses interrelation of human, animal, and environmental health, focusing on zoonotic diseases, antimicrobial resistance, and other public health threats.

 The Kajiado county programme, supported by AMREF Health Africa, will streamline service delivery across three departments namely medical services, environment and agriculture.

The one health programme will also benefit the community through a one health digital hub developed by the Cooperative University of Kenya (CUK).

Speaking during a three-day sensitisation meeting for Kajiado Members of the County Assembly, Prof Wycliffe Oboka from CUK said they have a Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) with the county on how they can leverage agricultural cooperatives and use gender responsive health care financing.

Through the MoU, he said, they have been supporting each other in various areas of development looking at how they can leverage agricultural cooperatives specifically for implementing the ‘One Health approach.

 Many pandemics and diseases, Prof Oboka said, have an interaction between man and animals and therefore as a way of facilitating that process, they have developed a one health digital platform.

Agricultural cooperatives, Prof Oboka added, have become an important vehicle through which the messages including registration can be of benefit to community and farmers in the villages and therefore the digital platform they are developing and piloting connects farmers in the village with experts and they are abled to report incidences through the platform and get feedback immediately.

He stressed that there is a very huge opportunity in enhancing healthcare financing using agricultural cooperatives that can reach a huge number of Kenyans saying the world is moving towards One Health.

“We are currently  piloting the digital project in Loitokitok and it has shown a lot of interest. With Kajiado county now coming up with a one health strategic plan, it is timely considering again it will be among maybe 5 counties that have embraced the one health approach”,  Prof. Oboka said.

Speaker of the County Assembly, Kajiado Hon. Justus Ng’ossor said the 3-day training on issues of one health unit and their strategic plan will help coordination of three different departments that are dealing with matters health and also be able to come out with resolutions on how to deliver services in the better way.

 Health CEC Kajiado Alex Kilouwa said having a One Health Care Approach strategic plan is very significant to Kajiado County as it is a county that has a lot of livestock who interact with humans and thus prone to zoonotic disease

“The three committees of the assembly namely health, water and environment as well as Agriculture and Fisheries have for the last three days gone through training on the One Health Care Approach that will see have sustainable financing through incorporating the three into one”, he said .  

Kilouwa said today they have validated on the One health strategic plan and been able to come up with a road map of the document which will now move to the County Cabinet through the Governor, presented by the three committees before the officially launching, “One Health Strategic plan 2025/2030”.

He thanked the presentation done by the cooperative university of Kenya on the one health digital hub, saying it will be able to assist the community and also fill in the knowledge gap especially in the rural areas.

“The hub will allow the people in the rural areas to for example make a photo of even report a sick animal and they leverage on veterinary officers or even doctors  on the platform  by getting a response quickly”, the CEC said.

 Joram Onditi from AMREF Health Africa in Kenya said they have been training members of the county assembly and other stakeholders on the importance of embracing the One Health approach that is very key in addressing diseases that basically affect  human beings from animals and the environment.

“In the recent past, we realized that over 70 percent of diseases that affect humans basically get transmitted from animals. Some of them include the recent pandemic, COVID-19 and so through this approach, we will be able to combat and prevent most of those zoonotic diseases such as brucellosis, anthrax and even the COVID.

He noted that  not many Counties have embraced the the One Health approach saying more sensitization is needed for them to understand the benefits of  using the One Health approach to combat and promote health among their populations

Kenya has had a One Health Strategic Plan for the prevention and control of zoonotic diseases (2021-2025) that was developed with subject matter experts from human, environmental and animal health sectors, researchers and policy formulators at the national and county levels.

For Kajiado County , the  "One Health Approach" strategic plan provides a comprehensive framework for strengthening effective implementation of one  health approach in the county, enhancing public health surveillance, preparedness,  response and control of public health events and promotion of applied research using the  one health approach while strengthening intersectoral collaboration by fostering  partnerships with various stakeholders including; government agencies, non-state actors and the private sector.