[ad_1]
It is not certain if it came from a bat or a pangolin, but one thing is: the coronavirus outbreak that has killed tens of thousands and upset the world comes from the animal world.
Human activity allowed the virus to jump on people, and specialists warn that if nothing changes, many other pandemics of this nature will follow.
The name given to diseases transmitted from animals to humans is “zoonosis”, based on the Greek words for “animal” and “disease”.
They are not new: tuberculosis, rabies, toxoplasmosis, malaria, to name just a few, are all zoonoses.
According to the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP), 60 percent of human infectious diseases originate from animals.
This number rises to 75 percent for “emerging” diseases such as Ebola, HIV, avian influenza, Zika, or SARS, another type of coronavirus. The list goes on.
“The onset of zoonotic diseases is often associated with environmental changes or ecological disturbances, such as agricultural intensification and human settlement, or invasions into forests and other habitats,” said a 2016 UNEP report.
“Changes in the environment are generally the result of human activities, ranging from change in land use to climate change.”
Gwenael Vourc’h of INRAE, a French public research institute, also blames human activity for cross-species.
“Given the growth of the human population and its increasingly intense use of planetary resources, the destruction of more and more ecosystems multiplies the contacts,” she says.
A key area of concern is deforestation to make way for intensive farming and ranching.
Domesticated animals are often a “bridge” between nature and human pathogens. The widespread use of antibiotics in the livestock industry has also led to bacterial pathogens that increase immunity to first-line drugs.
Urbanization and habitat fragmentation are also highly detrimental to the balance between species, while global warming can push disease-carrying animals into new territory.
‘Unprecedented in human history’
The new coronavirus is believed to have emerged in a wet market in the central Chinese city of Wuhan late last year.
Scientists believe it originated from bats and could have been transmitted through another mammal such as a pangolin, an endangered species whose meat and scales are prized in parts of Asia.
But researchers have yet to find a definitive answer on how it migrated people.
The only sure thing is that human activity facilitated the jump.
“The process that carries a microbe, like a virus, from a population of vertebrates like bats to humans is complex, but human-driven,” says Anne Larigauderie, executive secretary of IPBES, the UN panel of experts on biodiversity.
“People, through their actions, create opportunities for microbes to get closer to human populations.
“The rate of global change in nature over the past 50 years is unprecedented in human history, and the most important direct driver of change in nature is change in land use.”
Beyond the current coronavirus outbreak, IPBES estimates that zoonoses kill about 700,000 people a year.
A study by US researchers published last week and completed before the new coronavirus outbreak identifies rodents, primates, and bats as hosts to three-quarters of the viruses transmitted to humans.
But pets also carry around 50 percent of the identified zoonoses.
In terms of endangered wildlife, the study shows that those who share the majority of viruses with humans are precisely “populations in decline due to exploitation and loss of habitat.”
Christine Johnson of the University of California Veterinary School, who led the study, blames the human need to “alter the landscape.”
“This also increases the frequency and intensity of contact between humans and wildlife, creating the perfect conditions for the spread of the virus,” she says.
‘Global tragedy’
According to Larigauderie, this coronavirus outbreak may be the tip of the iceberg.
“Increasing trends in land use change, combined with increasing trends in world trade and travel, are expected to increase the frequency of pandemics in the future,” she says.
“A transformative change is needed to find a solution to this global tragedy.”
Vourc’h is also calling for a systemic response.
“Beyond the essential response to each epidemic, we must think about our model … rethinking our relationship with natural ecosystems and the services they provide,” he says.
The 2016 UNEP report, which noted that “ecosystem integrity underpins human health and development,” said there are already effective strategies to control the most neglected zoonosis. However, the main limitation seemed to be the “lack of investment”.
At 86 years old, Jane Goodall has spent most of her life studying and defending animals, especially chimpanzees in Africa, especially Tanzania. And she does not throw blows on where she blames.
“This was predicted to happen and will happen again until we learn the lessons,” says the British primatologist.
“It is our lack of respect for nature and our lack of respect for the animals with which we should share the planet that has caused this pandemic.”
Your premium period will be expire in 0 day (s)
close x
Sign up for unlimited access Get 50% discount now
[ad_2]
