New report shows wildlife trade, deforestation led to emergence of new zoonotic diseases

In a new study published, scientists have found that the large-scale conversion of tracts of land for agriculture, trade, and consumption of high-risk wild species are the two main drivers of the emergence of the zoonotic diseases, Worldwide Fund for Nature (WWF) report released on June 17 said. Scientists found the causes of the spread of the Zoonotic diseases and the role that wildlife played in such diseases affecting people, domestic animal health, welfare, economics, and trade.  

According to a report titled ‘COVID 19: urgent call to protect people and nature’, WWF emphasized that the major environmental factors due to which the zoonotic diseases emerge and thrive are the trade and consumption of high-risk wildlife, land-use change leading to deforestation and conversion, expansion of agriculture and unsustainable intensification and animal production. Further, the WWF called for urgent global co-operation to address these key drivers it has identified to eliminate the possibility of the near future pandemics that pose ‘an acute threat to human life’.

In the study, researchers observed that numerous warnings from scientists and thought leaders, such as the World Economic Forum (WEF), were made about the risk of a global pandemic even before it hit the world. The report identified that the early SARS patients in Guangdong province were involved in wildlife for consumption. Also, land-use change between 1945 and 2005 contributed to most zoonotic disease events, WWF said, citing West and Central Africa where extensive deforestation caused Ebola. WWF warned India to take measures noting that there was a looming threat. “In a country like India, where people live cheek-by-jowl, not just with each other, but also with among the highest numbers of livestock, close proximity means that the diversity of pathogens that humans are potentially exposed to is very high,” Abi Tamim Vanak, fellow, Wellcome Trust and senior fellow at Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment was quoted saying.  

Director-General of WWF International, Marco Lambertini, said in the study, We must urgently recognize the links between the destruction of nature and human health, or we will soon see the next pandemic. We must curb the high risk trade and consumption of wildlife, halt deforestation and land conversion as well as manage food production sustainably.

Read: Wildlife Expert Condemns Death Of Elephant, Says Responsibility Of Action Lies With State

Read: China: Police Bust Wildlife Trade Racket Amid Ban On Consumption Over COVID-19 Fears

‘One Health’ approach

Advocating a ‘One Health’ approach linking the health of people, WWF said that the COVID-19 crisis demonstrates that the systemic changes must be introduced by humans to the environmental drivers of pandemics. Additionally, the WWF highlighted the upcoming UN Biodiversity Summit, scheduled to take place in September 2020, saying, it would be an integral meeting for world leaders to take action and form policies on nature. It recommended the leaders to take critical decisions on the environment, climate, and development, now due to be taken in 2021 in order to rescue the world from the pandemic's outbreaks.  

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