Contagion Across Species: Global Histories and Ecologies of Zoonotic Diseases
The COVID-19 pandemic, caused by a virus that crossed from animals to humans, cast a sharp spotlight on the enormous challenges posed by ‘zoonoses’. This talk by Michael Bresalier considered historical perspectives on the changing ways in which zoonoses have been framed and tackled as global problems connected to human interactions with animals. It showed how zoonoses are rooted in growing ecological problems such as rapid changes to the environment and the globalised systems of animal food production and consumption.
About the Historian
Michael Bresalier is a lecturer in the history of modern medicine and global health at Swansea University. His research examines how international health organisations have shaped knowledge and experiences of health and disease in the twentieth century. He is especially interested in the role of United Nations agencies (WHO, FAO, UNICEF, etc) in tackling problems of hunger, nutrition, and infectious disease in humans and animals, and with how these problems have been crucial to projects of development, human rights, and humanitarianism.
