Living Safely With Bats: Lessons in Developing and Sharing a Global One Health Educational Resource

Abstract

The Living Safely With Bats picture book development process provides a model for collaboratively creating educational resources to combat zoonotic disease spillover risk. We discuss lessons learned from the process and future considerations for tool development and evaluation.

Abstract

Key Findings

• From the Living Safely With Bats book’s inception to distribution, the content development team engaged and collaborated with multilevel stakeholders from multiple countries on the diverse cultural contexts and local knowledge, attitudes, and behaviors regarding zoonotic diseases.

• The book development process provided insights on how to strategically adapt text and artwork targeted at community-level implementation to reinforce public health and wildlife conservation messages that could be tailored to audiences according to their risk compositions and local contexts.

• Integrating multisectoral feedback from experts in animal health, human health, and conservation at every facet of the project ensured that a One Health lens was applied throughout the development process.

Key Implication

• Global research efforts should budget for both planned and potential projects that can translate findings into community-oriented, evidence-based risk communication materials. This includes providing support for evaluation activities.

ABSTRACT

As part of a public health behavior change and communication strategy related to the identification of a novel ebolavirus in bats in Sierra Leone in 2016, a consortium of experts launched an effort to create a widely accessible resource for community awareness and education on reducing disease risk. The resulting picture book, Living Safely With Bats, includes technical content developed by a consortium of experts in public health, animal health, conservation, bats, and disease ecology from 30 countries. The book has now been adapted, translated, and used in more than 20 countries in Africa and Asia. We review the processes used to integrate feedback from local stakeholders and multidisciplinary experts. We also provide recommendations for One Health and other practitioners who choose to pursue the development and evaluation of this or similar zoonotic disease risk mitigation tools.