TOP STORIES
KnoxNews.com - www.knoxnews.com
27 Jul 2009
M Simmons
Photo credit: A Brimer
Area: Tennessee, USA
This summer, investigators with the University of Tennessee and the Knoxville Zoo are collecting hellbenders to test for a pathogenic fungus linked to the sharp decline of frogs and other amphibians throughout the world.
The fungus, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis, was first identified in 1998 after it caused widespread frog deaths in Australia and Central America. Scientists now believe it may have entered North America as early as the 1970s, and likely was introduced by infected African clawed frogs sold in pet stores and used in research.
The fungus causes a disease that infects not just frogs, but salamanders, too. So far, it has only been identified in the Ozark hellbender, a subspecies of Arkansas and Missouri.
Mystery of the massive bat die-offtheday.com - www.theday.com
26 Jul 2009
J Benson
Area: Northeast, USA
. . . One New Hampshire woman with a small roost in her barn, von Oettingen said, reported finding eight pups on the floor. Typically, mother bats will quickly retrieve fallen pups, but seven of the eight died after about an hour on the floor with no mother in sight. The last lived a couple of days, then died.
At the University of Connecticut in Storrs, Francois Courtin, a veterinary medicine post-doctoral fellow in pathology, has analyzed about 40 dead bats sent to him by Kocer and her counterparts in New York state. The animals were collected in hibernacula in the two states visited by the biologists in late winter.
All 40 had the fungal infection, he said. Courtin said he is anticipating the release of new research findings by colleagues at other laboratories this fall, and has applied for a federal grant to study how the fungus is being transmitted. “We are hoping to make a contribution,” Courtin said.
Closing the door on potential pandemicsBBC News - news.bbc.co.uk
27 Jul 2009
W Karesh
Geographic and environmental boundaries that once protected us from widespread disease outbreaks are no more, says William Karesh. In this week's Green Room, he calls for the West to adopt a "prevention is better than cure" approach to human and animal health.
Today, the expanding human population and activity has opened the pandemic "window" even wider.
A major component of any strategy to protect ourselves must involve treating disease before it gets to us.
OTHER WILDLIFE RELATED NEWS
Photo credit: Associated Press
Hope of freedom for orang-utans dashed
- Rockland fish kill caused by virus; humans, drinking water unaffected - Hackensack River, New York, USA - Map It
- Steller Sea Lions In Jeopardy: Wildlife Research on the Last Frontier
- 121 breeding tigers estimated to be found in Nepal
- Massachusetts studying roads, highways to reduce turtle mortality
WILDLIFE HEALTH RELATED PUBLICATIONS
Browse complete Digest publication library here.
Evaluation of Student Abilities to Respond to a "Real-World" Question about an Emerging Infectious Disease
J Vet Med Educ. 2009 Summer;36(2):216-9
DN Phalen
Parasite zoonoses and climate change: molecular tools for tracking shifting boundaries
Trends Parasitol. 2009 Jun;25(6):285-91. Epub 2009 May 8
L Polley and RC Thompson
The toxicology of climate change: environmental contaminants in a warming world
Environ Int. 2009 Aug;35(6):971-86. Epub 2009 Apr 16
PD Noyes et al.
Avian influenza - Scientific and Technical Review - 2009
28 Volume, 1 Issue
Table of contents includes:
- Epidemiology of low pathogenic avian influenza viruses in wild birds
- Outbreaks of highly pathogenic avian influenza in Europe: the risks associated with wild birds
- Intra- and interspecies transmission of H7N7 highly pathogenic avian influenza virus during the avian influenza epidemic in the Netherlands in 2003
European Journal of Wildlife Research - August 2009
Volume 55, Issue 4
