Episode Details

Hope Ferdowsian, President and CEO of Phoenix Zones Initiative (PZI)—a non-profit organization committed to advancing the interconnected rights, health, and wellbeing of people and animals—joins us on the podcast to discuss how the organization is striving to realize optimal health outcomes for humans and non-human animals alike. More specifically, Hope shares how, by expanding upon the One Health approach, PZI is centering justice as a primary mechanism for realizing such outcomes. We also discuss why PZI focuses on transforming animal research in their advocacy. Plus, Hope explains the Belmont Report, including why the ethical principles such as respect for autonomy, beneficence, non-maleficence, and justice, as outlined in the report, should also be applied to non-human beings.  

Hope Ferdowsian is a double board certified physician who has cared for individuals who have experienced displacement and violence and has worked on policy to address structural inequities and human and animal exploitation. Her work across six continents has included collaboration with the Office of the Surgeon General of the United States and the development of medical, public health, and educational resources for nongovernmental organizations, national governments, and intergovernmental organizations. As a result of her work, Hope was named a Humanitarian of the Year by the American College of Physicians in 2017. Many of her publications, including her book Phoenix Zones: Where Strength Is Born and Resilience Lives, focus on ethics, global public health, and the link between human and animal rights, health, and wellbeing. In 2019, she co-founded Phoenix Zones Initiative to translate insights in the book into a movement for systemic change. She now also serves as an associate professor in the Department of Medicine at the University of New Mexico School of Medicine.

“We need to push forward the idea that we can only have optimal health outcomes in humans and non-human beings through justice.” – Hope Ferdowsian

Highlights for Episode 637: 

• • • How Phoenix Zones Initiative supports animal rights
    • Why we cannot have health for both humans and non-human animals without rights and justice 
    • How One Health has been co-opted by industries, federal agencies, and international agencies and why its misuse damages optimal health outcomes in humans and non-human beings
    • Practical applications of the Just One Health approach and how the Phoenix Zones Initiative seeks to influence policy
    • How PZI is engaging members of Congress, policymakers, and other stakeholders to ensure that there is more transparency around the use of animals in research
    • How PZI is supporting a current Senate bill that aims to prevent wildlife trafficking
    • The importance of moving federal funding away from animal research and toward more modern, ethical, human-centered research methods
    • How PZI hopes to play a part in the establishment of a strategic roadmap that helps federal agencies in the US create a path away from animal research and toward more ethical methods that are better for both animals and people