EFSA Releases One Health Report, Says Zoonotic Disease Instances Have Dropped
The annual EU One Health zoonosis report, released by the European Food Safety Authority (EFSA) and the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control (ECDC), reported that campylobacteriosis was the most reported zoonosis in the EU in 2020, followed by salmonellosis. Campylobacteriosis had 120,946 cases in 2020, as compared to more than 220,000 in 2019. Salmonellosis affected 52,702 in 2020, compared to 88,000 in the previous year. In addition, the number of reported foodborne outbreaks also dropped by 47 percent.
Experts acknowledged the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic in Europe in the large drop in reported zoonotic diseases in humans—ranging from 7 percent to 53 percent depending on the disease in question—and foodborne outbreaks.