Zoonotic Behavioral Resource Assessments (ZBRA) Toolkit

"Human behavior drives epidemics…and can stop them. Behavioral research helps us prevent, detect, and respond."

The Zoonotic Behavioral Resource Assessments (ZBRA) toolkit is a repository for research on select zoonotic diseases (diseases that can spread between humans and animals), with an emphasis on risk and prevention behaviours, individual and sociocultural drivers, and the policy and communication environment that influences those behaviours. The Breakthrough ACTION project, with United States Agency for International Development (USAID) funding, developed ZBRA to equip researchers, public health practitioners, government officials, and others to conduct behavioural research on priority zoonotic diseases (PZDs) and to learn from existing research. The ultimate purpose of ZBRA is to strengthen behavioural research on PZDs in order to inform evidence-based risk communication and community engagement (RCCE) as we prepare to prevent, detect, and respond to the next epidemic.

ZBRA is focused on research conducted by Breakthrough ACTION in 11 countries in Africa that are implementing RCCE programing under the Global Health Security Agenda (GHSA). Each of the 11 Breakthrough ACTION GHSA countries has a page on ZBRA that summarises the PZDs for that country, the stakeholders involved in One Health activities, and existing Breakthrough ACTION research. Where possible, the pages also offer a case study explaining how behavioural research was used to inform social and behaviour change (SBC) interventions in the country.

The "Findings" section offers access to downloadable reports and papers from research conducted on One Health topics in selected GHSA countries. These resources highlight key preventative behaviours and risk behaviours that cross-cut common PZDs and could prompt a zoonotic event or propagate person-to-person transmission. They also offer insights on individual and sociocultural determinants influencing the behaviours.

Exploring drivers of behaviour requires well-tested research approaches. To that end, the research tools section ("Research" tab) provides quantitative survey questions and qualitative interview guides, by PZD, to explore determinants in local settings.