The One Health framework recognizes that human health, animal health, and environmental health are deeply interconnected. Improving animal welfare is therefore not just an ethical imperative but a public health strategy.
The One Health framework fundamentally reframes animal welfare from a moral luxury to a practical necessity. Zoonotic disease spillover events disproportionately emerge from high-stress, high-density animal keeping conditions. The relationship is bidirectional: animal welfare improvements reduce antibiotic use, which preserves efficacy for human medicine, which in turn allows better treatment of zoonotic infections. Environmental health completes the triangle - degraded ecosystems displace wildlife, increasing human-animal contact and spillover risk. Advocating for animal welfare is therefore also advocating for pandemic prevention.