$25-million Pandemic Fund aims to curb ‘zoonotic’ diseases

Union Animal Husbandry Minister Rajiv Ranjan Singh announces the G20 Pandemic Fund on October 25, 2024. Photo: X/@Dept_of_AHD

The Centre will implement $25-million G20 Pandemic Fund to develop a holistic health coverage for livestock in the wake of pandemics which transmit from animals to the humankind such as the COVID-19. Union Animal Husbandry Minister Rajiv Ranjan Singh announced the Fund on Friday (October 25, 2024). It is designed to enhance the country’s “animal health security” by upgrading and expanding animal health laboratories and developing laboratory networks.

The Centre said the Fund, to be implemented in partnership with the Asian Development Bank (ADB), the World Bank and the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), is to be utilised by August 2026. Mr. Singh said the Fund supports the existing initiatives of his department through enhancing disease surveillance, including genomic and environmental surveillance for early warning, laboratory infrastructure development, cross-border collaboration, and will create a more integrated system for monitoring and managing “zoonotic” diseases.

Secretary of the Ministry Alka Upadhyaya said the Fund was designed to bolster animal health security and that the initiative for pandemic preparedness and response marked a very significant step toward building a resilient framework to safeguard the country from “zoonotic” diseases.

Union Animal Husbandry Commissioner Abhijit Mitra said the country was at high risk of emerging infections as per the infectious diseases index. “India scored low (42.8) on the Global Health Security Index with a high level of environmental risks and public health vulnerabilities. 60% of pathogens that cause human diseases come from domestic animals or wildlife, and 75% of emerging human pathogens are of animal origin,” he said. Climate change was intensifying the risks and frequency of zoonotic disease in India and an example of that was the incidence of zoonotic mosquito-borne dengue illness, he said.

Mr. Mitra added that animal health security and improved animal diseases management were fundamental to strengthening India’s pandemic preparedness and response (PPR), but was being the weakest link in India’s PPR. “This pandemic fund project addressing human health through the lens of animal health would reduce the risk that a pathogen emerging from animal (domesticated or wildlife) and transmitting to the human population endangering their health, nutrition security, and livelihoods of vulnerable population (small-holding farmers, especially women),” he said.

The Fund is also aimed at developing human capacity-building initiatives to enhance the skills and capabilities of animal health human resources. It will also be used to upgrade data management systems, and enhancing analytics capabilities will enable better risk assessment, improved decision-making and more effective communication strategies related to animal health risks. The project hopes to strengthen institutional capacity at both national and regional levels by supporting the development of a disaster management framework for the livestock sector.