Wildlife Disease News Digest

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Economics of a Pandemic
American Institute for Economic Research - aier.org
22 Dec 2008
Photo credit: Sharon Ben-Arie, Wikimedia Commons

The slaughter of more 370,000 chickens in China last week has rekindled concern about the possibilities of a global flu pandemic. The birds were killed after the discovery of that some were infected with the deadly H5N1 virus.

AIER’s December Economic Education Bulletin addresses the public health and economic consequences of a bird flu pandemic that could be caused by a mutated H5N1 virus. In “Bird Flu Economics,” William F. Ford, a recent AIER visiting research fellow, reports on the work of those who model for disaster.

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Plea for Help Spotting Bat Killer
BBC News - news.bbc.co.uk
22 Dec 2008
Photo credit: Alan Hicks

Bat groups and cavers across the UK have been asked to report suspected cases of an illness that has killed bats in the US. The organisation has produced a guide to the syndrome on its website. It includes advice on what to look for, how to record cases and where to send data.

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Understanding How Infectious Diseases Spread Depends On Unlocking Secrets Held In Existing Data
Science Daily - sciencedaily.com
23 Dec 2008

Often experiments are needed to make scientific progress, but sometimes the answers lie in data already collected, requiring new analysis tools to unlock the secrets. This applies to infectious disease transmission, main topic of a recent workshop organised by the European Science Foundation (ESF), which called for development of new mathematical and statistical tools capable of probing deeper into existing databases relating to human contact and pathogens.

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Bovine TB infection still threatens human health in the UK
Telegraph - telegraph.co.uk
22 Dec 2008
L Cockcroft
Area: UK - Map It

Although the possibility of infection is very low it is possible to contract the disease through contact with cattle or badgers, meaning country dwellers may be at risk. Researchers writing in the British Medical Association journal Thorax cite a case in which a veterinary nurse, her young daughter and dog all tested positive for bovine TB. The 42-year-old worked with animals in Cornwall, where TB is common in cattle, and had suffered with a chesty cough for a month before diagnosis. Her pet dog then developed a similar persistent cough four months later, and was found to have the same strain of bovine TB.

>>>FULL ARTICLE

Bison Are Back, But Can They Survive? [Audio Program]
National Public Radio - npr.org
21 Dec 2008
J Froehlich
Area: USA - Map It

An estimated 60 million bison roamed the prairie when Columbus arrived in the New World in 1492. By 1900, only hundreds were left after herds were slaughtered for meat, pelts and sport. Although there are now half a million bison in the United States, researchers have discovered that most of them carry cattle genes — placing the animals at risk.

>>>FULL ARTICLE

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