How does ethics of animal use factor into One Health interventions?

• A. Ensures humane treatment, minimizes unnecessary harm, respects cultural norms, and balances animal welfare with public health goals.
• B. Animals should always take priority over human health even if it harms public health.
• C. Animals are not considered in ethics.
• D. Ethics only concerns financial costs.

Answer: (A)

Ethics in One Health means weighing animal welfare alongside human health and environmental outcomes. The best answer captures that interventions should be humane, minimize harm, respect cultural norms, and balance animal welfare with public health goals. This ensures actions are justified, proportionate, and transparent, and that communities are involved in decisions. In practice, it guides how we handle animals in surveillance, testing, treatment, and control measures, prompting humane handling, appropriate use of vaccines, and only painful or lethal interventions when necessary and conducted with safeguards. Other options miss key ethical dimensions: prioritizing animals over human health would undermine public health; ignoring animals in ethics fails to recognize their welfare; and ethics addresses more than costs, including welfare, justice, and cultural considerations.