This winter’s newsletter includes the latest information about our 7th symposium in December, welcomes Dr Kristin Dyet from ESR to our Management Group and highlights OHA investigators who continue to provide media with accurate and timely expert opinion on the COVID-19 pandemic. View the OHA Winter 2021 Newsletter.

A unique study led by the Institute of Environmental Science and Research (ESR) with Watercare and the University of Auckland confirms the benefit of wastewater testing as an early warning system for COVID-19. The paper: Sensitivity of wastewater-based epidemiology for detection of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in a low prevalence setting, has been released as a preprint on…

We knew the Delta variant would eventually arrive in Aotearoa, but real-time sequencing, which produces full genomes from positive cases in less than 12 hours, will ensure the lockdown is as short and effective as possible. There are now 21 cases and we can expect more to be reported over the coming days. Genome sequencing…

Eradicating COVID‑19 across the globe is theoretically more feasible than for polio but much less so than it was for smallpox, according to an analysis by New Zealand researchers. The researchers, writing in the international journal BMJ Global Health, ranked the feasibility of eradicating the three diseases based on technical, socio-political and economic factors. Smallpox, which…

OHA investigators and collaborators based at ESR and the NZ Food Safety Science Research Centre (NZFSSRC) have had an opinion piece published on Stuff which warns consumers about the emergence of Salmonella Enteritidis. This strain has been linked to 119 cases of salmonellosis since 2019, with 40 percent of those infected ending up in hospital.…

Weekly data collected by the Institute of Environmental Science and Research (ESR) is providing health experts with critical information about the outbreak of RSV currently being experienced across New Zealand. ESR virologist and OHA investigator Dr Sue Huang says weekly numbers reported by the national virus laboratory network started climbing sharply in June, reaching 538 cases…

Massey University Professor of Infectious Disease Ecology David Hayman has been selected alongside 25 other international experts to serve on the One Health High-Level Expert Panel to support worldwide organisations address issues of human, animal and ecosystem health. The World Health Organization, Food and Agriculture Organization, World Organisation for Animal Health, and United Nations Environment Programme (The Partners) have come together to…

Learn lessons from our COVID-19 response, or our health system could suffer the consequences. That’s the leading message from a group of five academics from the Universities of Otago, Canterbury and Massey, who say a failure to learn from this and previous outbreaks could result in a loss of time, knowledge and momentum for future…

Our autumn newsletter announces the dates of the 7th OHA Symposium (7-8 December 2021) in Wellington, highlights a research collaboration with Dr Alison Mather at the Quadram Institute in the UK, and shares information from the OHA Salmonella Bovismorbificans Workshop we hosted last month. View the OHA Autumn 2021 Newsletter.

Massey University Professor of Infectious Disease Ecology David Hayman has been a part of a team that has identified areas of the world that are at risk for new SARS-related coronavirus outbreaks. Professor Hayman worked alongside academics from the Polytechnic University of Milan (Politecnico di Milano) and University of California, Berkeley. He has previously worked…