Towards one Africa, one health: the Southern African Centre for Infectious Disease Surveillance One Health focus on infectious diseases.

© 2012. The Authors. Licensee: AOSIS OpenJournals. This work is licensed under the Creative Commons Attribution License. The genesis of the Southern African Centre for Infectious Disease Surveillance (SACIDS) is rooted in the realisation that infectious diseases are and will continue to be a formidable challenge to human welfare and economic development in Africa over the horizon of 30 years from 2005, and thereby impede Africa’s ability to meet the targets of the UN Millennium Development Goals (MDG). Several recent studies indicate that Africa probably has the highest burden of infectious diseases of humans and animals and yet the least capacity for their detection, identification, monitoring and risk management. Whilst climate change, changing in habitation and farming systems, globalisation of travel and trade are shared drivers for infectious diseases globally, certain other drivers have special relevance to Africa. These include the high human-livestockwildlife interaction, land use and socio-economic settings.