The One Health Platform , in which IMDEA Water participates, has been awarded by RTVE’s ‘El Escarabajo Verde’ in the category ‘public or private organisation for its work for the conservation of the environment’, for the vision with which it approaches health in an integral way by considering the three pillars that support it: the health of people, animals and the environment. The jury considered that this holistic view is necessary to raise awareness of the importance of preserving the environment in the future.

Created in 2021, the One Health platform is a statewide network that brings together the efforts of national collegiate organizations, associations and foundations from different fields. Its objective is to contribute to the necessary transformation required by healthcare management to meet the important healthcare challenges of the present and future. “Climate change and the severe drought we are experiencing remind us once again that the health of people is conditioned by the health of animals and the health of the environment. Today more than ever it is clear that we cannot continue to approach health from a perspective based on the treatment of human diseases, and that we must move towards a model of integrated health management that allows us to balance and optimize in a sustainable way the health of people, animals and ecosystems,” said Maite Martín, president of the One Health platform. “This recognition of our work encourages us to continue working to ensure that the One Health approach is truly translated into policy to achieve a greater good: protecting people’s health, reducing health inequities and preserving the sustainability of our planet,” he adds.

The jury for the awards was made up of: Asunción Ruíz, executive director of the Spanish Ornithological Society, SEO Birdlife; Elena Pita, director of the Biodiversity Foundation; Jacob Petrus, director and host of 
‘Aquí la tierra’, ; Pere Estupinyà, director and presenter of ‘El cazador de cerebros’., y Eduardo Laplaza, director of ‘El escarabajo verde’.

Other award winners include Pueblos vivos de Cuenca as ‘initiative coming from the civil society in favor of the environment’; the scientists Julio Díaz and Cristina Linares from Instituto de Salud Carlos III and members of the research group in Health and Urban Environment in the category ‘outstanding scientific personality in the environmental field’; and the singer Manolo García as ‘outstanding artistic personality in his work in favor of the environment’.

This year also includes a new award, the ‘Mària Sánchez Ledesma Award for her journalistic work in favor of the environment’. Mària Sánchez, RTVE journalist and the creator and first director of the program ‘El escarabajo verde’, passed away last March in Barcelona. This award in her honor went to RNE journalist Luisa Pérez Martínez, a relevant environmental communicator who has contributed to consolidate the current commitment of Spanish citizens to the defense of the environment from RNE.

‘El Escarabajo Verde’ is the weekly environmental program on RTVE’s La 2 that since 1997 has been documenting issues related to nature, ecology and sustainability necessary for life on Earth.

About the One Health Platform.

Born in 2021 from the effort of different entities to promote the One Health approach, the One Health Platform is a statewide network that brings together the efforts of companies, national collegiate organizations, associations and foundations belonging to different fields and sectors, giving it an interdisciplinary and intersectoral character to promote an integrative movement to improve public health.