From 9th to 20th December 2024, the city of Lyon and its metropolitan area are hosting a number of health-related events as part of the World Health Festival and the inauguration of the World Health Organisation (WHO) Academy’s campus in Lyon. ENS de Lyon, which joined the Shape-Med@Lyon
The One Health concept as seen through the eyes of LAHRHA scholars
In the special health issue of Pop’Sciences Mag published by the University of Lyon, you can now read the article focused on the intrinsic relationship between the environment and health. This view, which echoes the responsibility attributed to the pangolin from the Wuhan market for triggering the Covid pandemic, is however not new. Elisa Andretta, Senior CNRS Scholar at LAHRHA, reminds the ancient history of this concept, which could already be found in the writings attributed to Hippocrates. Stéphane Frioux, Head of LAHRHA, explains the conditions under which the concept of public hygiene, or ’the art of keeping communities healthy’, was gradually developed. It is worth noting that Lyon was one of the first French cities to set up a public health office in 1890. Paradoxically, medical advances in the twentieth century, with the explosion of biomedicine, put the environmental dimension of health on the back burner. However, it came back to the fore in the 1980s with the WHO, which defined health not only as the absence of disease, but also as physical and mental well-being in all’its forms. It was in the 2000s that the term "One Health" was coined, to emphasise the fact that health is shared by everyone on the planet: humans, wildlife, natural habitats and the environment in general.Find out more about The One Health concept
A World Health Festival in Lyon’s unique ecosystem
In 2021, the WHO chose Lyon as the place for the WHO Academy’s campus, designed as a ’school for the future, carrying the vision of a healthier, safer and fairer world’. To celebrate its inauguration on 17th December 2024, the French government, the Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes Region, the Metropole of Lyon, the City of Lyon and, of course, the WHO are organising a major international event, open to the general public, to raise public awareness of the major health issues and showcase the unique potential of the Lyon ecosystem. The World Health Festival.Innovation in healthcare, links between health and climate, challenges of training healthcare professionals, antimicrobial resistance, mental health... These are just some of the many themes addressed at the World Health Festival from 9th to 20th December 2024, through more than fifty events, including meetings, conferences, exhibitions, visits and short film screenings.
Scholars from ENS de Lyon will be taking part in a conference-debate hosted by the Institute Michel Serres on the theme of « One Health, Santé Planétaire, Santé Globale - des convergences vers la santé systémique, en partant du livre Manifeste pour une santé commune ».
The festival’s programme is transdisciplinary in order to highlight all the issues at stake in the concept of global health. The CNRS has invited scholars to take part in a poster session. The ICAR laboratory will be present at this session with a poster on the work of Julien Tiburce and Isabel Colon de Carvajal , which brings together approaches showing the contribution of language sciences to health issues.
A multi-disciplinary approach to health research and applications
The One Health concept calls for multidisciplinarity and even transdisciplinarity. Our exact and experimental science laboratories are naturally a stakeholder in scientific collaborations or partnerships on health issues. From the CIRI (infectiology) to the IGFL (functional genomics), publications and projects are flourishing, particularly in conjunction with hospitals such as the HCL and the Léon Bérard Centre. In addition to the biology laboratories, the physics and chemistry laboratories are not to be outdone (Fabien Montel’s work on virus transport, for example, and Jens Hasserodt’s contribution to developments in the fight against antibiotic resistance). This work can lead to innovations, as is the case with many of the projects that have passed through our incubator (Kurage, Molsid, Laclarée, Eydo Pharma, etc.).The social sciences are playing an increasingly important role in current approaches to health research, for instance with ICAR’s work in the language sciences or in philosophy on the body and pain ( Raphaele Andraud , author of the webdoc ’Le médecin face à la douleur ’ ). We can also note the development of training courses, such as the Masters in ’Plural Approaches to Health’ , under the responsibility of Julie Henry , Associate Professor in philosophy. The broad spectrum of disciplines covered by the School enables us to be in touch with this major challenge facing our communities, which is a strategic axis of the School’s policy. It is in this spirit that ENS de Lyon joined the Shape-Med@Lyon project at the start of the 2024 academic year, winning project under the PIA 4 ExcellencES de France 2030 , in order to be fully involved in the joint effort by the Lyon Saint-Étienne site to be one of the major players in global health.
ENS de Lyon, member of the Shape-Med@Lyon Its ¤28.1 million in funding will help to bring together all those involved in healthcare (academics, hospitals, industry, local authorities and the general public). This forward-looking project draws on all the scientific strengths of the Lyon-Saint-Étienne site to develop transformative research and training projects in the field of health and well-being, bringing together 5P medicine and the ’One Health’ concept, putting the individual back as the target and player in their environment.
Find out more about SHAPE-Med@Lyon (in french) This institutional involvement complements the many contributions made by our laboratories in the exact and experimental sciences and in the human and social sciences.
ENS de Lyon is also a partner of the EID@Lyon (Academic school of reasearch dedicated to emerging infectious diseases) and of the InfectioTron and spatial Cell-ID (instruments and technological developments). ENS de Lyon is the leader of the EquipEx+ Spatial Cell ID. The EquipEx+ Infectiotron is supported by UCBL.