Planetary Health Impacts of Pandemic Coronaviruses

Novel pandemic coronavirus (SARS CoV-2) was first reported in Asia in late 2019 and has spread rapidly and indiscriminately worldwide. Its full range of impacts will far exceed those resulting from the disease itself. The required global response to the virus has already impacted almost every industry, and this will translate into many direct and likely insidious impacts on human health and well-being in the near and longer term. Subsequent collateral impacts on the natural world, as well as our ultimate goals to live sustainably within it, can therefore also be expected. At the same time, the environment is an important moderator of the spread of COVID-19, and natural resources may also help mitigate the economic impacts of the global response to coronavirus. Lessons and opportunities that could help catalyze change towards a more sustainable, resilient and healthy future can be identified from this experience. With nature itself being the largest source of microbes that could become novel human pathogens, such wide ranging, intersectoral and potentially transformational impacts make pandemic emergencies of central relevance to the emerging field of planetary health.

We welcome submissions of Original Research, Mini Reviews, and Perspectives on how planetary health moderates and is affected by pandemic emergencies, including but not restricted to COVID-19. Contributions drawing key insights from past pandemics are welcome as are articles making novel contributions to the field of future pandemic preparedness, risk assessment and management. Submissions focusing on non-human outbreaks that offer the potential for cross-disciplinary impact will also be well considered.

Topics of interest related to pandemic coronaviruses, including but not restricted to COVID-19, could include:

• Strategies to reduce novel pathogen emergence: policy, conservation and health implications;
• Socio-environmental aspects of pandemic risk assessment and management;
• Interlinkages among impacts of pandemics on health, societies and the environment;
• Health and environmental co-benefits in the context of pandemics;
• Resilience and adaptation studies;
• Environmental justice;
• International voices and their perspectives on the current pandemic.

Important Note: All contributions to this Research Topic must be within the scope of the section and journal to which they are submitted, as defined in their mission statements. Frontiers reserves the right to guide an out-of-scope manuscript to a more suitable section or journal at any stage of peer review.