OPPORTUNITIES 2014-2017

Certificate Overview

Emerging infectious diseases and food safety problems are increasingly recognized as global and regional issues, with potentially serious impacts on human health, animal health, the environment, and national economies.  Often these problems are difficult to control because they require interdisciplinary and international partnerships and there are many barriers to such collaborations.  The One Health approach seeks to break down those barriers and to engage public health, veterinary health, and environmental health professionals in problem solving.  The One Health approach has been endorsed by numerous professional organizations and institutions. It is considered the best way to tackle some of today’s most troubling problems.

The primary purpose of this Certificate is to provide One Health training to public health, veterinary health, and environmental health professionals and students who wish to follow such careers.

This Certificate was designed to support companies, organizations, and governmental agencies in providing such One Health training to their employees and international partners.   In addition to the knowledge individual students gain, the Certificate will increase the professional capacities of their organizations and often improve their organization’s international relationships.

The University of Florida is one of the first academic centers in the world providing training for the One Health approach.  At present we offer PhD and MHS degree programs with concentrations in One Health.  This certificate program would be the third level of One Health training.

Additional benefits of the Certificate in One Health:

• Helps to meet the training needs of US and  international public health, veterinary health, and environmental professionals;
• Strengthens international relationships for the sponsoring organizations that will nominate students for scholarships to complete the certificate;
• Enhances the performance of international professionals who collaborate with US sponsoring organizations;
• Helps foreign countries train and retain their most promising new scientists with an educational strategy that will not demand their long-term absence; and
• Helps international students establish an academic track record of excellence such that they might compete and win external scholarships for more formal degree training (MS, MPH, and PhD through organizations such as Fogarty, USAID, etc.).