When Animals Hold the Key to Human Survival

What if I told you that most deadly diseases threatening humanity right now started in animals? From COVID-19 to bird flu, the next pandemic is likely already circulating in wildlife—and traditional medicine can't stop it alone.

Our health crises are no longer just human problems. Climate change is pushing disease-carrying animals into new territories. Urbanization is bringing us closer to wildlife. Factory farming is breeding superbugs that laugh at our best antibiotics. The old playbook of treating human, animal, and environmental health separately? It's failing catastrophically.

But there's hope.

Discover the cutting-edge "One Health" approach that's saving lives by connecting dots others miss. We'll dive into real-world victories where doctors, veterinarians, and environmental scientists joined forces to stop outbreaks before they became pandemics, tackle antibiotic resistance at its source, and build health systems that actually work in our interconnected world.

You'll see why the future of medicine isn't in hospitals—it's in understanding that human health is inseparable from the health of every creature and ecosystem on Earth.

Ready to rethink everything you thought you knew about staying healthy?

Dr. Michael Wilkes is Professor of Medicine at the University of California, Davis, and Director of Global Health. At UCLA he was a founder of UCLA's innovative Doctoring Curriculum which now serves as a model for UC Davis School of Medicine and many other medical schools domestically and internationally. Dr. Wilkes works frequently with medical schools and public health systems in Asia, Africa and Eastern Europe.

He is also an award-winning journalist having worked for the New York Times, ABC News, CBS News, and The Los Angeles Times. For more than 20 years, he's been the host of "Second Opinion" on public radio.

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