One Health(y) Cities: Cities are pandemic ecosystems and that’s where the action ought to happen

Abstract

Cities find themselves at the interface of many scales of engagement, activity, policy making and intervention when it comes to dealing with the causes, treatment, and recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic. These range from the microbiological to the planetary, and from the social scientific anthropological and social community patterns to hard science and clinical healthcare delivery. To make sense of this complexity we argue that cities ought to adopt the One Health paradigm, especially as One Health is purportedly a system of interconnected and coordinated zoonosis driven infectious disease approaches. The article demonstrates that an urban view of this biosecurity perspective is necessary, and argues One Healthy Cities are central to pandemic preparedness and recovery; are instrumental in confronting equity challenges.