The Second International Congress on Pathogens at the Human Animal Interface (ICOPHAI 2013)

<p>NON-TECHNICAL SUMMARY:<br/> Despite significant advances in public health and clinical medicine, infectious diseases continue to be a serious threat in both industrialized and developing countries. Diseases transmitted by food, water and of animal origin are major concerns world-wide and especially impose a significant disease burden in developing regions such as South America and Sub-Saharan Africa. More than two-thirds of emerging infectious diseases around the globe today are zoonotic. The lack of technical capacity and lack of interaction between technical experts, researchers and officials who work in different scientific disciplines are major limiting factors for the prevention and control of spread of such diseases. With these challenges in mind and building on to a successful inaugural conference held in 2011, we are organizing the "2nd International Congress on
Pathogens at the Human-Animal Interface (ICOPHAI): One Health for Sustainable Development" which will take place in Porto de Galinhas, Brazil, August 14-17, 2013. The goal of this congress is to stimulate interactions between scientists from developing and industrialized countries on priority thematic areas of diseases at the human, animal and ecosystem interface, as well as the social and economic impacts of these diseases. Furthermore, ICOPHAI 2013 will provide unique opportunities for participants to exchange knowledge and experiences on the key priority areas of infectious diseases. The conference will focus on selected thematic priority areas including one health meta-leadership, vector-borne zoonoses and impact on public health, emerging infectious diseases and the role of wildlife, foodborne and waterborne diseases. We have recruited internationally renowned keynote and plenary
speakers to address each of the priority thematic areas. In addition, we anticipate that about 80 oral and 200 poster presentations, mostly from students and post-doctoral researchers from developing and industrialized countries, will be presented.
<p>APPROACH:<br/> The congress will last three days with an opening session on August 14th and scientific sessions from August 15th to August 17th, 2013. The Congress is expected to attract 500 participants, mainly scientists and graduate students from academic and agricultural, health research institutions in developed and developing countries and scientists and policymakers from Brazil, USA and other nations. The main language of communication for the congress will be English.The Congress will have four types of sessions, which include: 1) Keynote Speakers: The ICOPHAI will have three keynote speakers, one for each day of the Congress, the main speech at the opening ceremony. Each keynote speaker will be given 60 minutes to address global issues at the interface priority animal, human and ecosystem; 2) Plenary Sessions: There will be eight main plenary sessions, whose
guest speakers, international scientists will have 45 minutes to address issues on key priority thematic areas. 3) Slide Sessions: Within each thematic plenary will be presented selected works based on scientific quality, whose maximum time of presentation will be 15 minutes; 4) Poster Sessions: Scientific studies of high quality relevant content to the defined themes of the congress will have the opportunity to be presented in poster sessions.The thematic areas include:One Health Meta-Leadership in Action: This session will include presentations on model "One Health" leadership approaches addressing complex problems using integrated systems, working across borders, leading and communication interface between research, training and policy actions and institutionalization of "One Health";Vector-borne Zoonoses and Impact on Public Health: This session will primarily focus on the
epidemiology, host-pathogen interaction, systems of prevention and control of major vector-borne pathogens, such as dengue fever;Emerging Infectious Diseases and the Role of Wildlife: This session will focus on emerging zoonotic infections that originate in wildlife, considering the ecosystem also shared by humans and the domestic animals;Drug Development and Antimicrobial Resistance: This session will emphasize new updates on drug development, antimicrobial use in humans, animals and the environment, the development of drug resistance, and the epidemiology of emerging resistance etc.;Foodborne and waterborne diseases: This session will focus on diseases with high morbidity and mortality such as Norovirus, Cryptosporidium, Salmonella, E coli O157 and others;Genomics and Rapid Pathogen Detection Systems: This session will focus on the systems state-of-the-art and applications for
detecting pathogens in a fast, accurate and highly efficient manner. Several phenotypic and genotypic methods developed for detection and subtyping will be examined;Parasitic Zoonoses and Environment: This session will mainly focus on parasitic diseases of major importance at the human-animal-ecosystem interface such as cysticercosis, toxoplasmosis and other diseases with high significance in developing regions; andImmunology and Vaccine Development: The goal of this session is the understanding of the immunological aspects and advances in the development of vaccines against various zoonotic pathogens.