These in-their-own-words pieces are told to Patricia Lane and co-edited with input from the interviewee for the purpose of brevity.

Veterinary medicine student Mikayla Astroff earned a Starfish Canada 2026 Climate 75 Fellowship for her work helping youth understand the impacts of climate change on our ecosystems. This 23-year-old combines her interest in wildlife health and zoonotic disease with her climate advocacy. 

Tell us about your interests.

Understanding how global warming is changing the health of our ecosystems requires us to understand both wildlife and human health. For example, as temperatures rise, the habitat for white-footed mice that host the ticks that carry Lyme disease is expanding northward. This shift causes a range of changes in ecosystem dynamics, affecting host species and raising public health concerns for humans.

I am interested in spotting the signs of zoonotic spread to alert decision-makers so they can safeguard the health of humans, ecosystems and animal communities at large. While I don’t know what exactly a........

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