Corals as canaries in the coalmine: towards the incorporation of marine ecosystems into the ‘One Health’ concept
‘One World – One Health’ is a developing concept which aims to explicitly incorporate linkages between the environment and human society in order to facilitate optimising aspects of health. Historically, work has concentrated on aspects of disease, in particular on emerging zoonoses, with a focus on terrestrial systems. Here we argue that the marine environment is a crucial component of the ‘One World – One Health’ framework, and that coral reefs are the epitome of its underlying philosophy, providing vast contributions to a wide range of ecosystem services with strong and direct links to human society. Further, the sensitivity of corals to climate change, and the current emergence of a wide range of diseases, make coral reefs ideal systems for studying in order to develop our understanding of the links, impacts, and feedback mechanisms that can affect human and ecosystem health. There are well established protocols for monitoring corals and global networks of researchers, but there are substantial challenges in studying these ecosystems. We explore these challenges and conclude with a look at how developing technology offers ways of addressing them in the future. A greater integration of coral reef research into the ‘One World – One Health’ framework will enrich our understanding of the complex links within and between ecosystems and human society, supporting the development of measures for improving the health of both humans and the environment.