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One Health Surveillance (OHS) implements the One Health approach to improving health by collecting data and producing information to support integrated action across the animal health, human health and environment sectors. The purpose of this study was to survey the biosurveillance community to assess its OHS practices and capabilities, its attitudes towards OHS (perceived value), and the factors that motivate its members to implement OHS practices. The authors used a convenience sample of 185 professionals from multiple domains and 44 nations. They examined the extent to which these professionals implemented OHS, gathered their opinions on the value of OHS, assessed their perceptions of the capacity to perform specific OHS tasks and identified their priorities for change. Over 85% of all respondents said that they considered OHS to be beneficial, with no significant differences between work domains or country income groups; over 50% indicated that they already applied OHS. Obtaining access to data collected by other domains was both the most frequent challenge and the most difficult to improve. The highest priority for improvement was having the ability to send and receive electronic data. Respondents from low-income or middle-income countries were more motivated to make improvements than stakeholders from high-income countries. These findings provide a snapshot of current opinions and practices and, together with suggestions for improvements from professionals in the field, can help to target priority needs for OHS information, training and resources.

Between May 2018 and 2019, a syndromic bovine mortality surveillance system (OMAR) was tested in 10 volunteer French departements (French intermediate-level administrative unit) to assess its performance in real conditions, as well as the human and financial resources needed to ensure normal functioning. The system is based on the automated weekly analysis of the number of cattle deaths reported by renderers in the Fallen Stock Data Interchange Database established in January 2011. In our system, every Thursday, the number of deaths is grouped by ISO week and small surveillance areas and then analyzed using traditional time-series analysis steps (cleaning, prediction, signal detection). For each of the five detection algorithms implemented (i.e., the exponentially weighted moving average chart, cumulative sum chart, Shewhart chart, Holt-Winters, and historical limits algorithms), seven detection limits are applied, giving a signal score from 1 (low excess mortality) to 7 (high excess mortality). The severity of excess mortality (alarm) is then classified into four categories, from very low to very high, by combining the signal scores, the relative excess mortality, and the persistence of the signal(s) over the previous 4 weeks. Detailed and interactive weekly reports and a short online questionnaire help pilot departements and the OMAR central coordination cell assess the performance of the system. During the 1-year test, the system showed highly variable sensitivity among departements. This variability was partly due not only to the demographic distribution of cattle (very few signals in low-density areas) but also to the renderer's delay in reporting to the Fallen Stock Data Interchange Database (on average, only 40% of the number of real deaths had been transmitted within week, with huge variations among departements). As a result, in the pilot departements, very few alarms required on-farm investigation and excess mortality often involved a small number of farms already known to have health or welfare problems. Despite its perfectibility, the system nevertheless proved useful in the daily work of animal health professionals for collective and individual surveillance. The test is still ongoing for a second year in nine departements to evaluate the effectiveness of the improvements agreed upon at the final meeting.

Created in 2011, the animal health epidemiological surveillance platform (ESA) aims at improving surveillance systems efficiency through technical and scientific support. The platform organization is an innovative concept because it is based on i) a partnership between private and public sector ii) the faith between all stakeholders and iii) a decision process through a consensus approach. This concept has proven its relevancy and efficiency. It encouraged the creation, in 2018, of two new epidemiological surveillance platforms, one for plant heath surveillance and the other one for food chain surveillance. All three platforms share the same objective, optimization of surveillance, with the same working principles., Créée en 2011, la Plateforme d’épidémiosurveillance en santé animale (ESA) a pour objectif d’apporter un appui scientifique et technique pour améliorer l’efficience des dispositifs de surveillance. Avec une gouvernance associant des acteurs publics et privés ainsi qu’une méthode de travail basée sur le consensus et la confiance entre les acteurs, la Plateforme ESA est un concept novateur qui a su démontrer sa pertinence et son efficacité. Elle a ouvert la voie, en 2018, à la création des Plateformes d’épidémiosurveillance en santé végétale et de surveillance de la chaîne alimentaire. Les trois plateformes partagent l’objectif d’optimisation de la surveillance et les méthodes de travail reposent sur les mêmes principes., Amar Hélène, Dupuy Céline. Les plateformes d’épidémiosurveillance : un concept novateur au service de l’efficience des dispositifs de surveillance. In: Bulletin de l'Académie Vétérinaire de France tome 173, 2020. pp. 200-205.

Background: Bovine cysticercosis (BCC) (due to Taenia saginata) is often claimed to cause considerable economic losses to the livestock industry, particularly in beef cattle, but recent studies estimating the economic impact are lacking. The current study aimed to quantify the annual economic impact of BCC in Belgium from 2012 to 2016, by gathering data from diverse sources in the meat and human health sectors. Results: In Belgium, on average, 15 carcasses with generalised infections and 1168 carcasses with localised ones are detected upon meat inspection each year. The highest proportion of the total economic losses due to bovine cysticercosis were borne by the cattle owners with an average economic cost of €3,408,455/year: €2,954,061/year due to BCC insurance, €453,024/year due to value losses of beef of uninsured carcasses (i.e. freezing process) and €1370/year due to destruction costs of uninsured carcasses with generalised infections. The slaughterhouses suffered an economic impact of €210,806/year. They were responsible for inspection costs related to meat inspection in general, administration, processing and deboning of infected carcasses (€597,856/year), value losses (€34,848/year) and destruction costs (€105/year) of carcasses insured by the slaughterhouses (unofficial insurance) (5% of slaughtered animals). On the other hand, the slaughterhouses gained a total of €422,004/year due to unofficial insurance fees. Thirty percent of all slaughtered animals were officially insured against BCC and the insurance company generated an income of €2,322,337/year. The economic impact related to taeniosis (10,991 patients annually) amounted to a maximum of €795,858/year. Conclusion: BCC and taeniosis due to T. saginata have a large economic impact in Belgium, mainly due to the insurance costs for BCC. These results indicate the need for reducing the number of BCC and taeniosis cases to avoid the costs and losses related to this parasite. Keywords: Taenia saginata, Bovine cysticercosis, Economic impact info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

International audience; Botulism type C was suspected in a 46-year old man after consumption of sick poultry from a flock where botulism type C was confirmed. The patient developed characteristic signs of botulism, but investigation of biological samples did not confirm the presence of Clostridium botulinum or botulinum toxin. Despite having classical botulism symptoms, the man recovered very quickly. This raises the question of botulism transmission to humans by ingestion of contaminated poultry.

International audience; The proportion of cattle with offal, partial or whole carcass condemnation could be a useful indicator for animal health syndromic surveillance purposes. It requires first highlighting the factors associated with condemnation in order to include them in a modeling process. This study aims to identify and quantify these factors. It was based on data from ten French cattle slaughterhouses from 2006 to 2010 (n = 1,439,868 cattle). Multivariable multi-nomial logistic regression analyses were performed. Sex, age and slaughterhouse were the main effects for offal, partial and whole carcass condemnation and have to be taken into account when implementing syndromic surveillance systems based on meat inspection data. The presence of an error in cattle identification was identified as a potential indicator for a higher risk of condemnation and should be explored as a potential factor for risk-based meat inspection.

International audience; Bovine cysticercosis is a foodborne disease caused by the cestode Taenia saginata with cattle as the intermediate host and humans as the final host. This disease is responsible for direct financial losses for farmers. It is also economically important because human infestation through raw or undercooked meat consumption can have a negative impact on the confidence the consumer has in the food industry. This study aimed to determine the apparent and true prevalence of bovine cysticercosis in France and describe the locations of identified cysticercosis lesions. The study sample included 4,564,065 cattle slaughtered in 2010 in France, among which 6491 were detected as harbouring cysticercosis lesions using the current EU meat inspection process. The overall apparent prevalence (including both viable and degenerated cysticerci) was estimated at 0.142% [0.142-0.143]. The true overall prevalence defined as the estimation of the prevalence after taking into account the sensitivity of meat inspection (detection fraction) was 1.23% [0.83-1.93]. The true prevalence of cattle with at least one viable cysticercus was 0.113% [0.076-0.189]. Taking into account both our results and those of a previous study on the prevalence of human cysticercosis in France, we estimated that one carcass could infest an average of 8-20 individuals. The spatial distribution of viable cysticerci showed that the highest apparent prevalence was found in eastern France. This study, the largest survey ever conducted on bovine cysticercosis in France, indicated a low but spatially heterogeneous prevalence of the parasite among the cattle population. Considering French eating habits, according to which it is not uncommon to consume undercooked meat, the possibility of humans being infested even though viable cysticerci are not detected during meat inspection is high. Increasing the detection sensitivity of meat inspection through the use of a risk-based meat inspection procedure should improve prevention of human infestation. (C) 2014 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

Meat inspection (MI) is one of the most widely implemented and longest running systems of surveillance. It was primarily introduced to identify meat of animals that is not fit for human consumption. Additionally, MI was progressively recognised as a suitable source of data collection and for monitoring a broad spectrum of diseases and conditions concerning animal health and welfare. For Europe, MI tasks are regulated at the European rather than country level and include a set of activities before and after stunning (ante and post mortem inspection) involving visual inspection, palpation and incisions. Over the last decade, the current MI protocol has been challenged because of its low sensitivity for important public health hazards. We aimed to assess the strengths and weaknesses of current MI protocols with primary focus on its utility in the context of animal health – including both notifiable and production diseases – and welfare, i.e. its capacity to detect cases with an aim to quantify the frequency of animal disease and welfare cases. The consequences of an alternative inspection protocol using visual-only inspection were also explored. As a first step, a review of grey and published literature was conducted for a selected number of diseases and welfare conditions in seven species or species groups: swine, poultry, bovines, small ruminants, solipeds and farmed game, represented by red deer, wild boar, rabbits and ostriches. This review highlighted a substantial lack of suitable and accessible published data on the frequency of occurrence of many diseases and conditions affecting food animals in Europe. Additionally, there were very limited data on the detection performance of MI, particularly in relation to specific degrees of severity of clinical signs. Due to the data gaps, a large proportion of input data used in this work was based on expert opinion and general biologic manifestations of the conditions investigated. The probability of case detection was quantified using a scenario tree modelling approach, taking into account the frequency of case presentation and inspection coverage. In general, the performance of MI was highly correlated with the presence of clinical and/or pathological signs in affected animals. Early or subclinical cases were likely to be “non-detectable” at slaughter. Regarding detectable cases, the impact of moving to visual-only inspection was negligible for most notifiable diseases and conditions considered with a few exceptions, primarily detectable cases of tuberculosis. Current MI activities were found to be effective to detect the majority of animal welfare conditions considered by species, predominantly by ante mortem inspection. The effectiveness of MI was also considered for endemic diseases that are not currently subject to systematic control efforts. These included respiratory diseases and parasite infections. It was shown that MI could provide an efficient means of identifying producers in need of animal health advice, provided that information is collected and fed back to veterinarians and livestock farmers. Within an integrated information system, MI could substantially contribute to the control of a considerable range of animal health and welfare issues. Data already collected need to be made available for on-farm decision making. It was also noted that if the slaughter population is strongly affected by international trade, i.e. where a large proportion of animals originate from one country and are slaughtered in another, the usefulness of MI for endemic disease surveillance will be affected by either reduced coverage or bias or both. In conclusion, our results indicate that while ante mortem inspection remains essential for the detection of animal welfare conditions, a move to visual-only post mortem inspection has – for the diseases and conditions considered – negligible negative impact on disease control. However in countries or regions that are not free of TB, special relevance of palpation and cutting of lymph nodes will have to be considered. MI information has considerable potential to inform disease control efforts, but only few countries use it systematically limiting the actual benefit that is achieved by these data. Finally, MI can also provide “back-up” surveillance in a situation where other means of detection fail and may represent the sole means of case detection for certain infections (e.g. liver fluke or cestodes)

The study reports the results of an electronic survey to identify surveillance stakeholder attitudes towards One Health Surveillance (OHS) and a workshop held at the 2014 ISDS conference to identify strategies from improving surveillance. The majority of respondents reported that OHS is valued and needed. Many respondents reported that improving surveillance is of medium to high priority, but that improvements would be difficult to make. Practical approaches for moving forward included cross domain staff exchanges, tools for data integration and reporting diseases across domains.

Slaughterhouses are a potential source of data which is under-used for cattle health monitoring. The objective of this work was to assess the performance of several algorithms for outbreak detection based on weekly proportions of whole carcass condemnation. Data from 177,098 cattle slaughtered in one French slaughterhouse from 2005 to 2009 were used. The Shewart p chart, one-sided confidence interval of a negative binomial regression model, and EWMA and CUSUM on residuals of a negative binomial model were investigated. The highest sensitivity was obtained using negative binomial regression and the highest specificity using CUSUM or EWMA.

Data sharing remains a barrier to joint surveillance and the establishment of contingency plans among countries and institutions. Summary statistics are hard to interpret and compare, and nomenclatures for animal disease classification are seldom used. SSynCAHD (Syndromic Classification in Animal Health Data) proposes to harmonise, through the development on an ontology, syndromic surveillance data use rather than data recording. This will be achieved by standardising classification into syndromes, based on records from different sources of animal health data which are (and will continue to be) recorded using an institution own vocabulary.

ISDS 2014 Conference Abstracts; International audience; Bovine cysticercosis is a zoonotic foodborne disease caused by "Taenia saginata" involving cattle as the intermediate host and humans as the final host. Due to the slow development of cysticercosis cysts in cattle muscles and the complexity of cattle movements, there is a strong bias to consider the last farm location before slaughter as the location of infection for spatial analysis. This study presents an innovative approach to spatial analysis that takes into account uncertainty regarding the location where the animal was infected. An animal-herd-level weighted analysis was used and applied to bovine cysticercosis in France.

The Triple-S project (Syndromic Surveillance Survey, Assessment towards Guidelines for Europe) is a 3-year European project, which main objective is to produce guidelines for implementing or improving a syndromic surveillance (SyS) system in animal and human health. The major expectation was the guidelines to be user-friendly, practical and based on concrete examples of existing systems in Europe.

The Triple-S project (Syndromic Surveillance Survey, Assessment towards Guidelines for Europe) is a 3 year European project. One main objective is to produce a proposal for coordinating syndromic surveillance (SyS) systems operated by European countries and for comparing findings from these systems. Three models have been identified for ensuring the comparison and reporting of findings from EU countries. For the sustainability of the models, a SyS coordinating group is needed to coordinate SyS activities in Europe.

The recent focus on the 'One Medicine' concept has resulted in an increased awareness that the control of diseases in animal populations, whether zoonotic or not, can be of great public health importance. However, awareness of the activities developed in the field of animal health is still low among public health workers. In this roundtable the facilitators will encourage discussion regarding what can public and animal health learn from each other, focusing particularly on how this cooperation can be promoted.

Motivated by the perception that human and veterinary medicines can cooperate in more ways than just fighting zoonoses, the authors organized a roundtable during the 2013 annual meeting of the International Society for Disease Surveillance (ISDS). Collaborations between human and animal health sectors were reported to often rise in response to zoonotic outbreaks (during crisis time) and be mainly based on personal networks. Ways to maintain and strengthen these links were discussed. Keywords: One Health; one medicine; public health; animal health; veterinary public health (Published: 15 April 2014) Citation: Infection Ecology and Epidemiology 2014, 4 : 24267 - http://dx.doi.org/10.3402/iee.v4.24267

International audience; Bovine cysticercosis is a zoonotic parasitic disease due to Cysticercus bovis. This study aimed to identify factors that could have an impact on the prevalence of cysticercosis and to use them to build standardized indicators of prevalence. Multivariate logistic regression analyses were performed on data from 4,564,065 cattle (91.3% of the cattle population slaughtered in France in 2010) among which 6491 cattle (0.14%) were found to harbor at least one lesion of cysticercosis (including 611 cattle harboring viable cysts, 0.01%). Two multivariate logistic models were fit to the data using as outcome variables either the presence or absence ofviable cysts and the presence or absence of cysts whatever their level of development. Age and sex were identified as the main factors influencing bovine cysticercosis prevalence and were used for the construction of standardized prevalence and standardized cysticercosis rate. To illustrate the use of such indicators, they were calculated for the first and second semester of 2010 and for two different areas in France. The differences between raw prevalence and standardized prevalence highlight the use of standardized indicators for comparisons of prevalence between different areas and time periods as the structure of the slaughtered populations differ considerably from one to another.

Background The Triple-S project (Syndromic Surveillance (SyS) Systems in Europe), co-financed by the European Commission, was launched in September 2010 for a three year period. This study presents and discusses the results of the Triple-S inventory of the European animal and human health SyS systems or initiatives as well as the advantages of synergies between human and animal health SyS. Methods European SyS systems were identified …

International audience; The financial impact of condemnation for farmers and the importance of efficiency in the meat inspection process to guarantee food safety are well known. Identifying farm-level risk factors for condemnation are useful in order to find a way for farmers to potentially reduce their condemnation rates and to build a risk-based farm classification for veterinary services to target both meat inspection and farms inspections. To our knowledge, this has not yet been done, probably due to a lack of available meat inspection data. A preliminary investigation was performed through a case-control study on 36 French farms, from a dairy production region to identify farm-level risk factors for high condemnation rates (i.e. more than 45% of cattle with at least one portion of the carcass condemned). Multivariable exact logistic regression was performed to take into account the small sample size. The final model identified two significant risk factors. The odds of having a high condemnation rate was at least twice as greater for farmers who did not adhere to the quality charter of an international retailer and was significantly higher when the most qualified worker on the farm had a degree in agriculture. This latter effect was unexpected and is reviewed in the discussion section. The protective effect of the quality charter could be explained by the annual control of farms performed to guarantee compliance with good farming practices in the adhering farms. It led us to believe that compliance with well known good farming practices could be a way for farmers to reduce their condemnation rates. This study is a preliminary investigation performed on a small sample size of farms that were mainly dairy farms. It is a first step for further investigations that need to be done on this topic at a larger scale to fill the current lack of knowledge.

Objective The objective of this study, based on the Triple-S project outputs, was to present the existing synergies between human and animal health syndromic surveillance (SyS) systems in Europe and a proposal to enhance this kind of collaboration. Introduction The Triple-S project (Syndromic Surveillance Systems in Europe, www.syndromicsurveillance.eu), co-financed by the European Commission and involving twenty four organizations from fourteen countries was launched in September 2010 with the following objectives 1) performing an inventory of existing or planned SyS systems in Europe both in animal and public health, 2) building a network of experts involved in SyS 3) producing guidelines to implement SyS systems, 4) developing synergies between human and animal health SyS systems. The project is based on a cooperation between human and animal health experts, as supported by the One Health initiative [1]. Methods A network of European experts involved in SyS was identified through the Triple-S inventory of SyS systems. A meeting of human health experts was organized back to back with a similar meeting with animal health experts in Paris, September 12–14, 2011. A joint session human/animal health allowed experts to discuss the interest of synergies between both sides. The objectives were to 1) encourage experience and knowledge transfer, 2) discuss what and how information should be shared between both sides to improve respective performances. Results The results of the inventory of veterinary SyS systems showed that 40% of identified systems already shared or had planned to share information with human health sector. For these systems the collaboration between human and animal health sectors consisted in meetings on a regular basis to discuss the surveillance results. Discussions during the Triple-S meeting highlighted two reasons for enhancing synergies between both sides. First human health and animal health epidemiologists face common statistical and epidemiological issues when dealing with SyS, i.e. use of data collected for other purpose than surveillance; standardization of clinical observations; syndrome definition; anomaly detection; interpretation of unspecific signals; response to alerts. Both sides have thus interest in sharing their experiences and knowledge to improve their respective systems. Second, systems on both sides have similar objectives and target health events potentially threatening both animal and human populations: zoonoses, extreme weather events, environmental / food contamination, bioterrorist attack... For those events, animal population can play the role of sentinel for human population. Regular information flow between human and animal SyS could thus enhance the timeliness and sensitivity of SyS systems for detecting unexpected health events. Moreover, sharing information could help animal and human health experts to interpret and confirm unspecific signals, and confirm the impact of common health threats. All participants of the meeting agreed on the idea to routinely share outputs of the systems but were sceptical about sharing raw data to perform global analysis. Conclusions Each aspect of the Triple-S project includes both human and animal health and will thus contribute to build natural collaboration between both sides. Such a project has demonstrated that scientific community is more and more willing to collaborate beyond the boundaries of these two health fields. Synergies between human and animal health seem as necessary for syndromic surveillance as it is for traditional surveillance, if not more. They seem especially important for the detection of emerging zoonotic threats but not only. Sharing surveillance outputs from both sides would be the first step of collaboration but deeper synergy, e.g. sharing data and analyse them globally, could also be considered. Triple-S guidelines for implementation of SyS systems in Europe will take into account and promote synergies between human and animal health.

International audience; Within the current context that favours the emergence of new diseases, syndromic surveillance (SyS) appears increasingly more relevant tool for the early detection of unexpected health events. The Triple-S project (Syndromic Surveillance Systems in Europe), co-financed by the European Commission, was launched in September 2010 for a three year period to promote both human and animal health SyS in European countries. Objectives of the project included performing an inventory of current and planned European animal health SyS systems and promoting knowledge transfer between SyS experts. This study presents and discusses the results of the Triple-S inventory of European veterinary SyS initiatives. European SyS systems were identified through an active process based on a questionnaire sent to animal health experts involved in SyS in Europe. Results were analyzed through a descriptive analysis and a multiple factor analysis (MFA) in order to establish a typology of the European SyS initiatives. Twenty seven European SyS systems were identified from twelve countries, at different levels of development, from project phase to active systems. Results of this inventory showed a real interest of European countries for SyS but also highlighted the novelty of this field. This survey highlighted the diversity of SyS systems in Europe in terms of objectives, population targeted, data providers, indicators monitored. For most SyS initiatives, statistical analysis of surveillance results was identified as a limitation in using the data. MFA results distinguished two types of systems. The first one belonged to the private sector, focused on companion animals and had reached a higher degree of achievement. The second one was based on mandatory collected data, targeted livestock species and is still in an early project phase. The exchange of knowledge between human and animal health sectors was considered useful to enhance SyS. In the same way that SyS is complementary to traditional surveillance, synergies between human and animal health SyS could be an added value, most notably to enhance timeliness, sensitivity and help interpreting non-specific signals. (c) 2013 Elsevier B.V. All rights reserved.

International audience; BACKGROUND: The slaughterhouse is a central processing point for food animals and thus a source of both demographic data (age, breed, sex) and health-related data (reason for condemnation and condemned portions) that are not available through other sources. Using these data for syndromic surveillance is therefore tempting. However many possible reasons for condemnation and condemned portions exist, making the definition of relevant syndromes challenging.The objective of this study was to determine a typology of cattle with at least one portion of the carcass condemned in order to define syndromes. Multiple factor analysis (MFA) in combination with clustering methods was performed using both health-related data and demographic data. RESULTS: Analyses were performed on 381,186 cattle with at least one portion of the carcass condemned among the 1,937,917 cattle slaughtered in ten French abattoirs. Results of the MFA and clustering methods led to 12 clusters considered as stable according to year of slaughter and slaughterhouse. One cluster was specific to a disease of public health importance (cysticercosis). Two clusters were linked to the slaughtering process (fecal contamination of heart or lungs and deterioration lesions). Two clusters respectively characterized by chronic liver lesions and chronic peritonitis could be linked to diseases of economic importance to farmers. Three clusters could be linked respectively to reticulo-pericarditis, fatty liver syndrome and farmer's lung syndrome, which are related to both diseases of economic importance to farmers and herd management issues. Three clusters respectively characterized by arthritis, myopathy and Dark Firm Dry (DFD) meat could notably be linked to animal welfare issues. Finally, one cluster, characterized by bronchopneumonia, could be linked to both animal health and herd management issues. CONCLUSION: The statistical approach of combining multiple factor analysis with cluster analysis showed its relevance for the detection of syndromes using available large and complex slaughterhouse data. The advantages of this statistical approach are to i) define groups of reasons for condemnation based on meat inspection data, ii) help grouping reasons for condemnation among a list of various possible reasons for condemnation for which a consensus among experts could be difficult to reach, iii) assign each animal to a single syndrome which allows the detection of changes in trends of syndromes to detect unusual patterns in known diseases and emergence of new diseases.

Background Until 2008, human rabies had never been reported in French Guiana. On 28 May 2008, the French National Reference Center for Rabies (Institut Pasteur, Paris) confirmed the rabies diagnosis, based on hemi-nested polymerase chain reaction on skin biopsy and saliva specimens from a Guianan, who had never travelled overseas and died in Cayenne after presenting clinically typical meningoencephalitis. Methodology/Principal Findings Molecular typing of the virus identified a Lyssavirus (Rabies virus species), closely related to those circulating in hematophagous bats (mainly Desmodus rotundus) in Latin America. A multidisciplinary Crisis Unit was activated. Its objectives were to implement an epidemiological investigation and a veterinary survey, to provide control measures and establish a communications program. The origin of the contamination was not formally established, but was probably linked to a bat bite based on the virus type isolated. After confirming exposure of 90 persons, they were vaccinated against rabies: 42 from the case's entourage and 48 healthcare workers. To handle that emergence and the local population's increased demand to be vaccinated, a specific communications program was established using several media: television, newspaper, radio. Conclusion/Significance This episode, occurring in the context of a Department far from continental France, strongly affected the local population, healthcare workers and authorities, and the management team faced intense pressure. This observation confirms that the risk of contracting rabies in French Guiana is real, with consequences for population educational program, control measures, medical diagnosis and post-exposure prophylaxis., Author Summary Until 2008, rabies had never been described within the French Guianan human population. Emergence of the first case in May 2008 in this French Overseas Department represented a public health event that markedly affected the local population, healthcare workers and public health authorities. The antirabies clinic of French Guiana, located at Institut Pasteur de la Guyane, had to reorganize its functioning to handle the dramatically increased demand for vaccination. A rigorous epidemiological investigation and a veterinary study were conducted to identify the contamination source, probably linked to a bat bite, and the exposed population. Communication was a key factor to controlling this episode and changing the local perception of this formerly neglected disease. Because similar clinical cases had previously been described, without having been diagnosed, medical practices must be adapted and the rabies virus should be sought more systematically in similarly presenting cases. Sharing this experience could be useful for other countries that might someday have to manage such an emergence.

Background: In Catalonia (north-eastern Spain), Taenia saginata has been described in cattle but its occurrence in humans is unclear. Moreover, whether cattle acquired the infection in Catalonia or outside Catalonia and its economic impact have not been investigated. This study aimed to estimate the prevalence and spatial distribution of bovine cysticercosis in Catalonia (2008–2015), and the burden from T. saginata upon the animal and human sectors in Catalonia (2013–2015). Methods: Data on cattle diagnosed with cysticercosis at meat inspection were collected and analysed. Cattle movement history was used to identify the most likely place of bovine cysticercosis infection and to investigate its spatial distribution. Data on taeniosis treatment (niclosamide and praziquantel) costs and their supply in Catalonia as well as data on patients attending primary care with diagnosis of taeniosis were collected. The financial impact associated with T. saginata due to carcasses condemned and frozen, meat inspection and human taeniosis was estimated. Results: During 2008–2015, between 18 and 107 cattle were found positive for cysticercosis each year (prevalence at slaughter of 0.010%). Movement history was available for 44% of the infected cattle and in 53% of them Catalonia was identified as the place where the infection was acquired with highest probability. Two significant bovine cysticercosis clusters were detected. The number of patients diagnosed with taeniosis in primary care during the period 2013–2016 was 41–63/year. The overall economic impact of T. saginata (2013–2015) amounted to 154,903 €/year (95% CI: 113,075–196,762). Meat inspection accounted for 81.9% (95% CI: 75.8–86.2%) of the costs, followed by costs due to carcass condemnation and freezing (9.4%; 95% CI: 6.9–12.8%), and taeniosis-associated costs (8.7%; 95% CI: 6.7–11.6%). Costs due to freezing and condemnation of carcasses reached 19,442 €/year (95% CI: 17,528–21,391) (509 €/lightly infected carcass and 1,140 €/heavily infected carcass). Taeniosis-associated costs were estimated at 12,848.5 €/year (237 €/patient). Conclusions: The public health risk of T. saginata in the area seems to be low. The economic impact due to T. saginata was mainly attributed to meat inspection. The cost due to carcass condemnation and freezing was limited compared to the revenue of the beef sector. Developing and implementing risk-based surveillance is needed to lower the costs of meat inspection. Considering cattle movements might be useful in the development of such a strategy. Keywords: Taenia saginata, Bovine cysticercosis, Taeniosis, Economic impact info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion

International audience; RNA sequencing (RNA-seq) has become one of the most powerful tools to unravel the genomic basis of biological adaptation and diversity. Although challenging, RNA-seq is particularly promising for research on non-model, secretive species that cannot be observed in nature easily and therefore remain comparatively understudied. Among such animals, the caecilians (order Gymnophiona) likely constitute the least known group of vertebrates, despite being an old and remarkably distinct lineage of amphibians. Here, we characterize multi-tissue transcriptomes for five species of caecilians that represent a broad level of diversity across the order. We identified vertebrate homologous elements of caecilian functional genes of varying tissue specificity that reveal a great number of unclassified gene families, especially for the skin. We annotated several protein domains for those unknown candidate gene families to investigate their function. We also conducted supertree analyses of a phylogenomic dataset of 1,955 candidate orthologous genes among five caecilian species and other major lineages of vertebrates, with the inferred tree being in agreement with current views of vertebrate evolution and systematics. Our study provides insights into the evolution of vertebrate protein-coding genes, and a basis for future research on the molecular elements underlying the particular biology and adaptations of caecilian amphibians.