Pandemic panic and anxiety in developing countries. Embracing One Health offers practical strategies in management of COVID-19 for Africa

Currently, there is a global shortage of masks and personal protective equipment (PPE) and distribution is being rationed in developed countries to retain this for workers in the health system [5], showing that developing countries in Africa are bound to suffer more should the pandemic be mismanaged at these early stages. The introduction of the One Health initiative provided international agencies i.e. the Food and Agricultural Organization (FAO), Organization for Animal Health (OIE), World Health Organization (WHO) and the World Bank, with a vehicle for interinstitutional and interdisciplinary collaboration to address the threat of emerging zoonotic diseases, and it enabled these international agencies and national authorities to come to the table as equal partners in the search for solutions [7]. Competing interests All authors declare no competing interests. 1 Infection Medicine, Deanery of Biomedical Sciences, College of Medicine and Veterinary Medicine, University of Edinburgh, United Kingdom 2 Faculty of Biomedical Sciences, Kampala International University Western Campus, Box 71 Bushenyi, Uganda 3 Department of Animal Production and Management, Faculty of Agriculture and Animal Sciences, Busitema University, Box 236 Tororo, Uganda 4 The Royal (Dick) School of Veterinary Studies and the Roslin Institute, University of Edinburgh, Roslin, EH25 9RG, United Kingdom 5 Department of clinical pharmacy and Pharmacy practice, School of Pharmacy, Kampala International University Western Campus, Box 71 Bushenyi, Uganda 6 Department of Physiology, School of Medicine, Kabale University, Kabale, Uganda 7 Department of Anatomy, School of Medicine, Kabale University, Kabale, Uganda 8 Department of Physiology, School of Health Sciences, Busitema University 9 Department of Physiology, School of Health Sciences, Soroti University, Soroti, Uganda 10 Department of Microbiology and Immunology, School of Medicine, Kabale University, Kabale, Uganda 11 Zhejiang University-University of Edinburgh Institute, Zhejiang University School of Medicine, International Campus, Zhejiang University, 718 East Haizhou Road, Haining, Zheijang 314400, Peoples Republic of China