Dynamics of Zoonotic Disease at the One Health Interface: Evidence from a Systematic Review

Abstract

E156 micro-paper format, Summary Findings

A disparity in the burden-versus-investment landscape in African health research reveals a systematic health research gap. Cross-sectional audits registered on ClinicalTrials.gov through the month of April 2026 evaluated 23,873 African and 190,644 audited international trials.  Whereas the USA registered 36 relevant trials, Africa registered 0, revealing a striking 36-fold gap in research volume. Additionally, a Shannon entropy of 2.46 bits indicated that the trial distribution was highly concentrated rather than being evenly distributed, signifying structural imbalance. These results highlight a key imbalance between the geographical burden of zoonotic diseases and the allocation of research investment. Absence of Sub-national data and exclusion of observational studies limit the interpretation of the findings, which may further underestimate existing research activity. Several studies in sub-Saharan Africa revealed challenges experienced in carrying out the studies, among others, insufficient funding, because preference was given to pandemic rather than endemic zoonotic diseases, among other challenges.(Eshun et al., 2024)