Category Archives: Bushmeat

Coronavirus outbreak reignites bushmeat debate

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The epidemic has led to renewed calls for an outright ban on the consumption of wild animals.

Seized pangolin scales at the Kwai Chung Customhouse Cargo Examination Compound in Kowloon, Hong Kong. Experts have suggested that consumption of bamboo rats or pangolins may have enabled the coronavirus to transfer to humans. Image: USAID Asia, CC BY-SA 3.0 By Wang Chen, Chinadialogue Feb. 10, 2020

There is growing pressure for fundamental reform of China’s policy on the trade in wild animals following the outbreak of a novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), which to date has infected over 31,000 and killed more than 600, with numbers rising.

The early cases of coronavirus were clustered around the Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market in the central Chinese city of Wuhan. Was the market’s trade in wild animals the source of the virus? One early study published 26 January in the Lancet suggested otherwise. Nonetheless, calls for a ban on the trade in wild animals have reached new highs.

On 26 January, the forestry, market supervision and agricultural authorities announced a nationwide ban on the trade in wild animals, including placing captive-breeding facilities under quarantine, for the duration of the epidemic. These have been described as the toughest restrictions ever enforced on China’s wild animal trade.

But the ban has a time limit. A similar crackdown was also seen 17 years ago during the SARS epidemic. With China now tackling another major virus outbreak, there is pressure for far-reaching policy changes.
Bushmeat and viruses

The latest research shows the genome of the new virus is 96% identical to a coronavirus found in bats, making them the most likely source – as was the case with SARS. It is not yet clear how the virus made its way into the human population. Zhong Nanshan, head of a National Health Commission expert panel and a member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, has suggested bamboo rats or badgers may have been an intermediate host.
Research published on 7 February by the South China Agricultural University claims that pangolins – one of the most trafficked mammals in Asia – could also be a link. There is as yet no definitive conclusion, but close contact between humans and an intermediate host would have allowed the virus to jump the species barrier.

A price list from the Huanan market, circulated online, shows that prior to its closure on 31 December, meat from animals such as the bamboo rat and civet cat were openly on sale. The civet cat is believed to have been the intermediate host in the SARS epidemic.

Bushmeat is an important part of the cuisine of the mountainous south-east of China. Consuming wild animal meat to improve health is also connected to traditional Chinese medicine. But this tradition has been taken to extremes, with beliefs that the meat of animals with certain characteristics, such as strength, will boost that characteristic in the consumer, and that the “wilder” an animal is the more health benefits it provides. Civet cats are the most prized of all.

As well as encouraging the hunting of wild animals, this demand has also led to some bushmeat species being farmed at scale and sold through established channels. A China Central Television programme on money-making has promoted bamboo rat farming more than once – most recently in June last year – saying that 500 grammes of bamboo rat meat, described as “popular online”, can sell for 80 Chinese yuan (US$11).
Farmers featured on the programme were earning up to 10 million yuan
(US$1.4 million) a year.

Popular internet celebrities, the Huanong Brothers, became famous for filming the process of farming – and eating – bamboo rats. They have a presence on all of China’s major streaming sites, tens of millions of fans nationwide and are seen as typical of the farming boom in Ganzhou, Jiangxi province. Many other underdeveloped areas are now hoping to enrich themselves through bamboo rat farming.

Wu Yu, a blogger for online magazine Elephant, writes that the definition of “wild animal” in Chinese legislation is fuzzy, covering all animals not traditionally considered poultry or livestock – even when, as with the bamboo rat, there is a mature farming sector. An outright ban on the trade in wild animals would harm the legitimate interests of those farmers, he said. “It’s hard to prove that these herbivores, raised in captivity, are more dangerous than poultry and pigs, which have already given rise to bird flu and swine flu.”

But Zhou Haixiang, a member of the Chinese National Committee for Man and the Biosphere, told China Dialogue that the majority of wild animals traded have been obtained illegally. He was also sceptical about farmed
animals: “Even if the farm is properly run, where did the animals originally come from? They’ve been domesticated, but aren’t they descended from animals caught in the wild? There’s still a risk of infection.”
Food & Agriculture
Chinese consumers ignore calls to eat less beef Read now ‘Reasonable use’

Zhou thinks there is huge money in the wildlife trade, but also “potential public health risks”. He argues the existing Wild Animals Protection Law and Protection Measures for Wild Land Animals leave too much room for the large-scale commercial use of wild animals.

Current regulations mean bamboo rats can be farmed once licences have been obtained.

The lessons from SARS did not dent appetites for bushmeat. Consumption bounced back less than a year after the 2003 epidemic, and in Guangdong grew into a “high-class” pursuit. Policymakers started to look for a balance between market demand and regulation, and in August 2003, the forestry authorities produced a list of 54 animals suitable for commercial breeding and farming, setting out qualifications for entry to the sector, a quota management system and a labelling system. The aim was to regularise the practice rather than ban it.

This was the first official recognition that wild animals could be farmed, and businesses making “reasonable use” of these animals started to grow legitimately. Once a farm had health certificates and breeding and business licences in place, they were free to operate.

But many of these farms are “laundering” wild-caught animals. Lü Zhi, a professor at Peking University’s School of Life Sciences, said that these farms “briefly place wild-caught animals in a licensed farm, before sending them to market”.

The debate between “protection” and “reasonable use” has been ongoing ever since the SARS epidemic. It reached a peak in 2015, when the process of revising the Wild Animals Protection Law started.
Unfortunately, “reasonable use” remained written into legislation, and more policies encouraging the sector appeared. A key document in 2018 called for China to “accelerate the growth of the farming and display of wild animals”, and the wild animal sector was linked with the promotion of rural economies. In 2019 the forestry authorities proposed increasing wild animal breeding capacity to boost market supply.

“Allowing for reasonable use is an error in the Wild Animals Protection Law’s approach,” said Zhou Haixiang. He points out that although wild animals have been bought and sold for decades, and even generate billions of yuan in income for some provinces and cities, this approach to protection does nothing for ecological balance and public health.
Revision providing opportunity

The coronavirus has strengthened calls for a complete ban on bushmeat, with universities, research institutes, independent political figures, NGOs and the media calling for the law to be changed. But there are different ideas on what that ban should look like. The current focus of debate is on how to protect the interests of those who are already operating legally.

Zhou thinks public health concerns mean all breeding, farming and trading of wild animals should be banned. This may lead to losses for some legitimate operations, but is nevertheless “essential” to stop illegal hunting.

“The industrial and commercial authorities, which oversee the market, don’t have the necessary specialist knowledge to distinguish captive-bred and wild-caught animals,” he argues.

Lü Zhi’s proposal leaves more room for manoeuvre. She thinks eating bushmeat is the most dangerous way to utilise wild animals, and it is also an unnecessary luxury. She suggests expanding a ban on the consumption of protected species to cover all wild animals, putting an end to the bushmeat trade.

But she also suggests reclassifying those animals already successfully bred in captivity and accustomed to their new environments as “special livestock”, to be regulated in a similar way to common poultry and farm animals. Both Lü Zhi and Zhou Haixiang think this distinction between wild animals and farmed animals should depend on whether a species can live and breed well in captivity, and if the risk of disease can be managed.

For Liu Kejun, a senior livestock specialist at the Guangxi Institute of Animal Farming who has been researching the breeding of bamboo rats for over 20 years, “farmed animals shouldn’t be a problem”. “Captive bamboo rats eat bamboo, sugar cane, elephant grass stalks and cassava stalks.
The farming process is very hygienic,” he said.

“As consumer awareness develops, we can expect the market for bushmeat to fall,” says Lü Zhi, but establishing a new category of farmed animals and gradually reducing available licences could give these farmers time to diversify and reduce losses.

Shortly after the 2003 SARS epidemic, 22 members of the Chinese Academy of Sciences called for a change to the law to halt the misuse of wild animals. Lü Zhi is more confident of success this time round: “This time it’s not just public opinion, the authorities are also keen. Things will change, we’ll just have to wait for the legislative process to conclude to see exactly how.”

https://www.eco-business.com/news/coronavirus-outbreak-reignites-bushmeat-debate/

Altered forests threaten sustainability of subsistence hunting

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Conservationists find birds in central African rain forest are facing major threats from bushmeat hunting

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https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2018-03/sdzg-cfb022818.php

SAN DIEGO ZOO GLOBAL

 

In a new study released this month, conservationists are sounding the alarm about a growing hunting crisis plaguing rainforests in central Africa. The study, published in the journal Biological Conservation, found that more large forest birds such as raptors and hornbills are being killed to provide bushmeat (wildlife taken for food) than previously thought. Researchers concluded that unless the threat posed by unsustainable hunting is reduced, bird populations will continue to decline–potentially leading to devastating consequences for the biodiversity of the region.

The study was conducted in the Littoral Region of Cameroon, where scientists surveyed 19 villages that border the proposed Ebo National Park in the western part of the country. Researchers used direct and indirect questioning and statistical models to quantify the socioeconomic predictors, scale and seasonality of illegal bird hunting, and bird consumption in the area.

“Understanding why people eat birds and quantifying how many are killed is just the first step in understanding how bushmeat hunting can affect birds like hornbills and eagles,” said Robin C. Whytock, a Ph.D. researcher at the University of Stirling in Scotland and lead author of the study. “I think birds such as crowned eagles are particularly threatened by hunting in Cameroon, both because of direct persecution and because their prey base has been depleted by hunting. These and other similar large-bodied birds that reproduce slowly are therefore a conservation priority.”

The science team also found surprising information they believe ties education levels to the amount of time people spend hunting and how much wildlife they consume.

The team originally thought that younger, unemployed men at lower education levels would consume more wild birds than other hunters. While the study did conclude that birds were primarily hunted and consumed by unemployed men during the dry season, the data unexpectedly revealed that hunting has increased among those with higher education.

This discovery may change the way scientists tailor future conservation programs, in reaching out to urban populations as well as rural communities. Conservationists could also focus on better informing those at higher education levels about the importance of specific bird species to their ecosystem. Moving forward, researchers said closer examination of other habitats will be necessary to fully understand the totality of the growing bushmeat hunting crisis.

The two-year study and analysis was conducted by numerous conservation and educational facilities, including the University of Stirling, the University of Dschang, Drexel University, Wageningen University and Research Centre, The Peregrine Fund, the Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, and San Diego Zoo Global.

Bringing species back from the brink of extinction is the goal of San Diego Zoo Global. As a leader in conservation, the work of San Diego Zoo Global includes on-site wildlife conservation efforts (representing both plants and animals) at the San Diego Zoo, San Diego Zoo Safari Park, and San Diego Zoo Institute for Conservation Research, as well as international field programs on six continents. The work of these entities is inspiring children through the San Diego Zoo Kids network, reaching out through the internet and in children’s hospitals nationwide. The work of San Diego Zoo Global is made possible by the San Diego Zoo Global Wildlife Conservancy and is supported in part by the Foundation of San Diego Zoo Global.

IDA-Africa Baby Gorilla Rescue!

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Last week In Defense of Animals-Africa was asked by its Cameroon government partner, the Ministry of Forestry and Wildlife (MINFOF), for help capturing a juvenile gorilla who was frequently eating from village farms. Farmers had been frightened by the gorilla, who did not seem to be afraid of them, and a young boy had broken his arm running away. IDA-Africa was not eager to take a free-living gorilla captive, but a team from its Sanaga-Yong Chimpanzee Rescue drove four hours to meet the MINFOF representative for a collaborative investigation. The team feared that the gorilla’s mother and others in his group had been killed by poachers.
They soon realized that the sweet six-year-old gorilla was not only unafraid of humans, he was actually seeking their company. He must have been captured as a baby by poachers, raised among humans who bought him as a pet, and dumped or “set free” near the forest when he became unmanageable. But this little lonely boy couldn’t fend for himself in the forest and would have been killed had his visits to the farms continued. The team had no choice but to capture and transport him back to Sanaga-Yong for temporary care. Since Sanaga-Yong only provides long-term care for chimpanzees, the gorilla was transferred a few days later to Ape Action Africa’s Mefou Sanctuary.
Tragically, each year thousands of baby chimpanzees, gorillas and monkeys are stolen from Africa’s forests by bushmeat poachers seeking extra profit in the pet and zoo trades, and rarely can these orphans be returned to a free life in the forest. Forest sites that meet criteria for reintroduction are nonexistent in many countries, and while there are a few success stories, released great apes endure stress and suffer high mortality. In well run sanctuaries, like Sanaga-Yong and Mefou, these surviving victims of poaching can usually find friendship and some happiness among other rescued orphans, but what they’ve lost is irreplaceable. Along with their mothers’ love and carefree childhoods, their freedom to self-determine and eventually have families of their own is gone forever.

TICKETS ON SALE NOW!

IDA-Africa Annual Gala

Saturday, September 10th 2016 from 6-10pm

The University Club in Downtown Portland Oregon

Please join us for our Sixth Annual Gala to benefit the chimpanzees of Sanaga-Yong Rescue Center. The evening’s festivities will feature Dr. Sheri Speede with an update on our rescue and conservation efforts in Africa including forest protection, sustainable agriculture, our education program and of course, a heartwarming update on the chimpanzees of Sanaga-Yong Rescue! And… get a sneak peek at a BBC pilot featuring our adorable and adventurous chimpanzees!

Purchase Your Tickets Today!: https://app.etapestry.com/cart/InDefenseofAnimals-Africa/default/category.php?ref=1165.0.75650093

Wikipedia on Bush”meat”

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http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushmeat

The term bushmeat, also called wildmeat and game meat, refers to meat from non-domesticated mammals, reptiles, amphibians and birds hunted for food in tropical forests.[1] Commercial harvesting and the trade of wildlife is considered a threat to biodiversity.[2]

Bushmeat also provides a route for a number of serious tropical diseases to spread to humans from their animal hosts.[3][4] Bushmeat is used for sustenance in remote areas, while in major towns and cities in bushmeat eating societies it is treated as a delicacy.[5]

Nomenclature[edit]

Today the term bushmeat is commonly used for meat of terrestrial wild or feral mammals, killed for sustenance or commercial purposes throughout the humid tropics of the Americas, Asia, and Africa. In West Africa (primarily Ghana, Ivory Coast, and Nigeria), Achatina achatina a giant African snail, is also gathered, sold, eaten, and monitored as part of the bushmeat trade.[6][7][8] To reflect the global nature of hunting of wild animals, Resolution 2.64 of the IUCN General Assembly in Amman in October 2000 referred to wild meat rather than bushmeat. A more worldwide term for terrestrial wild animals is game. The term bushmeat crisis tends to be used to describe unsustainable hunting of often endangered wild mammals in West and Central Africa and the humid tropics, depending on interpretation. African hunting predates recorded history; by the 21st century it had become an international issue.[9]

Extent[edit]

The volume of the bushmeat trade in West and Central Africa was estimated at 1-5 million tonnes per year at the turn of the century.[10] According to the Center for International Forestry Research (CIFOR) in 2014, approximately 5 million tonnes were still being consumed per year in the Congo Basin.[5]

For the people of this region, bushmeat represents a primary source of animal protein in the diet, making it a significant commercial industry. According to a 1994 study in Gabon, annual sales were estimated at US$50 million. The study found that bushmeat accounted for more than half of meat sold in local markets, with primates representing 20% of the total bushmeat.[11]

Dynamics[edit]

Two Malagasy hunters stand near a stream, one holding a gun, the other holding a lemur with a white head.

Endangered species, including lemurs from Madagascar are killed for bushmeat despite this being illegal.

Bushmeat is often smoked prior to consumption.

Logging penetration of forests[edit]

Logging concessions operated by companies in African forests have been closely linked to the bushmeat trade. Because they provide roads, trucks and other access to remote forests, they are the primary means for the transportation of hunters and meat between forests and urban centres. Some, including the Congolaise Industrielle du Bois (CIB) in the Republic of Congo, have partnered with governments and international conservation organizations to regulate the bushmeat trade within the concessions where they operate. Numerous solutions are needed; because each country has different circumstances, traditions and laws, no one solution will work in every location.[12]

Overfishing[edit]

In the case of Ghana, international over-exploitation of African fishing grounds has increase demand for bushmeat. Both EU-subsidized fleets and local commercial fleets have depleted fish stocks, leaving local people to supplement their diets with animals hunted from nature reserves. Over 30 years of data link sharp declines in both mammal populations and the biomass of 41  wildlife species with a decreased supply of fish.[13]

Public preference[edit]

In the case of Liberia in West Africa, bushmeat is widely eaten and is considered a delicacy.[14] A 2004 public opinion survey found that bushmeat ranked second behind fish amongst residents of the capital Monrovia as a preferred source of protein.[14] Of households where bushmeat was served, 80% of residents said they cooked it “once in a while,” while 13% cooked it once a week and 7% cooked bushmeat daily.[14] The survey was conducted during the last civil war, and bushmeat consumption is now believed to be far higher.[14]

Role in spread of diseases[edit]

The transmission of highly variable retrovirus chains causes zoonotic diseases. Outbreaks of the Ebola virus in the Congo Basin and in Gabon in the 1990s have been associated with the butchering of apes and consumption of their meat.[15] Bushmeat hunters in Central Africa infected with the human T-lymphotropic virus were closely exposed to wild primates.[16]

HIV[edit]

Results of research on wild chimpanzees in Cameroon indicate that they are naturally infected with the simian foamy virus and constitute a reservoir of HIV-1, a precursor of the acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (AIDS) in humans.[17] There are several distinct strains of HIV, indicating that this cross-species transfer has occurred several times.[18] Researchers have shown that HIV originated from a similar virus in primates called simian immunodeficiency virus (SIV); it is likely that HIV was initially transferred to humans after having come into contact with infected bushmeat.[19]

Animals used as bushmeat may also carry other diseases such as smallpox, chicken pox, tuberculosis, measles, rubella, rabies, yellow fever and yaws.[20] African squirrels (Heliosciurus, Funisciurus) have been implicated as reservoirs of the monkeypox virus in the Democratic Republic of the Congo.[21] The bubonic plague bacteria can transfer to humans when handling or eating prairie dogs.[22]

In many instances, catching the diseases mentioned above often occurs due to the cutting of the meat, in which animal blood, and other fluids may wind up on the people cutting it, thereby infecting them. Another way that people get infected is due to the fact that some portions of the meat may not be completely cooked. This often occurs due to the type of heating source employed: open fires over which the meat is simply hung.[23] Improper preparation of any infected animal may be fatal.[24]

Ebola[edit]

The Ebola virus, for which the primary host is suspected to be fruit bats, has been linked to bushmeat. Between the first recorded outbreak in 1976 and the largest in 2014, the virus has transferred from animals to humans only 30 times, despite large numbers of bats being killed and sold each year. In Ghana, for instance, 100,000 bats are sold annually, yet not a single case of transmission has been reported in the country. Primates may carry the disease, having contracted the disease from bat droppings or fruit touched by the bats. Like humans, it is often fatal for the primate.[5]

Although primates and other species may be intermediates, evidence suggests people primarily get the virus from bats. Since most people buy pre-cooked bushmeat, hunters and people preparing the food have the highest risk of infection. Hunters usually shoot, net, scavenge or catapult their prey, and studies indicate that most hunters handle live bats, come in contact with their blood, and often get bitten or scratched.[5]

In 2014, the Ebola outbreak in West Africa originated in Guéckédou in south-eastern Guinea and was linked to bushmeat after it was learned that the first case came from a family that hunted two species of fruit bat,[5] Hypsignathus monstrosus and Epomops franqueti.[25] A two-year-old child from that family, dubbed “Child Zero”, died from the disease on December 6, 2013. Despite the risk, surveys pre-dating the 2014 outbreak indicate that people who eat bushmeat are usually unaware of the risks and view it as healthy food. In Western Africa, bush meat is an old tradition, associated with proper nutrition. Because livestock production is minimal, people often consume bushmeat in a way comparable to how European societies consume rabbit or deer meat. Media coverage of the 2014 outbreak and its link to bushmeat has been criticized because it has failed to focus on the primary risk of infection, which is person-to-person.[5]

This was exemplified when a major Nigerian newspaper implied that eating dog meat was a healthy alternative to bush meat.[26] However, as human populations grow, the interactions between humans and wildlife will increase, making events like the 2014 outbreak more likely.[5]

Impact upon animal species[edit]

Pygmy hippos are among the species illegally hunted for food in Liberia.[27] The World Conservation Union estimates that there are fewer than 3,000 pygmy hippos remaining in the wild.[28]

The consumption of bushmeat threatens a wide range of species, including species that are endangered and threatened with extinction. For example, a range of endangered species are hunted bushmeat in Liberia.[27]

Species hunted for food in Liberia include elephants, pygmy hippopotamus, chimpanzees, leopards, duikers, and other monkeys.[27] Forest rangers in Liberia say that bushmeat poachers will kill any forest animal they encounter.[27]

Effect on great apes[edit]

A gorilla in the DR Congo, 2008. The use of buckshot has helped bushmeat hunters target gorillas by allowing them to more easily kill the dominant male silverback.

The great apes of Central and West Africa—gorillas and chimpanzees—are nearly ubiquitously sold as bushmeat throughout the region, and a study from 1995 suggests that the off-take is unsustainable.[11] With the exception of a 1995 report from Cameroon, where gorillas were considered a target species for hunters, Central and West African hunters do not appear to target them.[29] Historically, poachers have favored hunting chimpanzees because they flee when one is shot. Gorillas, however, only became easy targets when chevrotine ammunition became available, allowing the hunters to more easily kill the dominant male silverback whose role it is to defend his troop.[11]

Generally, great apes constitute a minor portion of the bushmeat trade. Although a 1996 study indicated that approximately 1.94% of animal carcasses sold and consumed in Brazzaville in the Republic of the Congo belonged to great apes, it accounted for 2.23% of the biomass of the meat sold, which is significant for ape populations relative to their ecosystem. Furthermore, these numbers may not have accurately represented the extent of the problem for the following reasons:[29]

  1. Vendors may not have admitted the sale of great ape meat because it is illegal;
  2. The carcasses are large, and may therefore have been consumed locally rather than been transported to large markets;
  3. Great ape hunting usually peaks when new forest areas are made accessible as they are unwary when unfamiliar with humans, but later hunting declines;
  4. It is nearly impossible to visually distinguish the meat source when it has been smoked;
  5. Secondary effects, such as unintended deaths from traps are not represented in market data.

During the time interval between a study from 1981–1983 and another study between 1998–2002 in Gabon, ape population density fell 56%, despite the country retaining nearly 80% of its original forest cover.[30] This decline was primarily associated with the transformation of the bushmeat trade from subsistence level to unregulated, commercial hunting, facilitated by transportation infrastructure intended for logging purposes.[11][30] Unsustainable hunting practices along with habitat loss makes the extinction of these endangered primates more likely.[31]

the Dangerous “Noble Savage” Myth

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Dave Foreman, formerly of Earth First! and now The Rewilding Institute, wrote in the glossary of his timely over-population book, Man Swarm and the Killing of Wildlife, of the “Noble Savage Myth: Jean Jaques Rousseau is the best-known flag-waver for the myth of the noble savage, which holds that man in a natural state was noble, peaceful, and ecologically sweet before being besmirched by civilization. Anthropology, archaeology, paleontology, history, field biology, conservation, and so on have shown this belief to have no ground on which to stand.” Foreman recommends the book, Constant Battles, by archeologist Stephen A. LeBlanc as the current must read on the subject. Having been keenly interested in the subject since reading Jarred Diamond’s The Third Chimpanzee, Richard Wrangham’s Demonic Males, and even before, I of course ordered Constant Battles to fill in the blanks.

The book arrived in the mail yesterday and I couldn’t wait to get started. From that book’s prologue: “War today and in the last century seems unprecedented in intensity, ferocity, and number of lives claimed. With this ominous could hanging over our heads, it’s easy to believe that humans have somehow abandoned the benign behavior that characterized our earliest history. What happened to those ‘noble savages’ of old who were content to live in peace and harmony and were not out to colonize and exploit the undeveloped world? The ecological catastrophes occurring all around us present another modern maelstrom—and no ecosystem is immune, from the tropical rainforest, from the pristine arctic to the ozone layer. Humankind today seems to have abandoned a reverence for nature and lost long-held abilities to live in ecological balance. Has ‘progress’—that escalating desire to be bigger, better, faster, stronger—totally extinguished our ancestral instincts to grow everything we consume and hunt only what we need to sustain us? Many view the march of civilization not as a blessing but a curse, bringing with it escalating warfare and spiraling environmental destruction unlike anything in our human past.

“Contrary to exceedingly popular opinion, and as bad as our problems may be today, none of this is true. The common notion of humankind’s blissful past, populated with noble savages living in a pristine and peaceful world, is held by those who do not understand our past and who have failed to see the course of human history for what it is.

“…I have spent my entire career attempting to make sense of the past, and I find the world completely at odds with popular misconceptions. Not only is the past I observed not peaceful and pristine, but, cruel and ugly as it may be, it provides great insight into the present. The warfare and ecological destruction we find today fit into patterns of human behavior that have gone on for millions of years. Humans have been destroying their environment for a long time and continue to do so for the same reasons they did in the past… [P]roper grasp of the past has invaluable benefits for humankind today. We are far better off understanding the past than ignoring it, or believing a mythical version of history that bears little to resemblance to what actually took place.

“A myth, due to its very nature, is not grounded in any reality, so it is susceptible to total manipulation. Though we can manipulate reality, it is subject to objective questioning, because we presume there is an objective basis to it. Once we accept a myth as truth without any consideration of its reality, how do we question its implications or manipulations on objective grounds? Myths are dangerous, and we are better off without them…”

00-intro

Is bushmeat behind the Ebola outbreak?

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Ebola: Is bushmeat behind the outbreak?

By Melissa Hogenboom BBC Health Check

Bushmeat

Bushmeat is believed to be the origin of the current Ebola outbreak. The first victim’s family hunted bats, which carry the virus. Could the practice of eating bushmeat, which is popular across Africa, be responsible for the current crisis?

The origin has been traced to a two-year-old child from the village of Gueckedou in south-eastern Guinea, an area where batmeat is frequently hunted and eaten.

The infant, dubbed Child Zero, died on 6 December 2013. The child’s family stated they had hunted two species of bat which carry the Ebola virus.

Bushmeat or wild animal meat covers any animal that is killed for consumption including antelopes, chimpanzees, fruit bats and rats. It can even include porcupines and snakes.

In some remote areas it is a necessary source of food – in others it has become a delicacy.

In Africa’s Congo Basin, people eat an estimated five million tonnes of bushmeat per year, according to the Centre of International Forestry Research.

Ideal hosts

But some of these animals can harbour deadly diseases. Bats carry a whole range of viruses and studies have shown that some species of fruit bats can harbour Ebola.

Via their droppings or fruit they have touched, bats can then in turn infect other non-human primates such as gorillas and chimpanzees. For them, like us, this can be deadly. Bats on the other hand can escape from it unscathed. This makes them an ideal host for the virus.

A bushmeat vendor in the Cantoments Market in Accra, selling grasscutters, bats, fish, antelope and moreCooked or smoked bushmeat is not usually harmful

Exactly how the virus “spills over” into humans is still not clear, says Prof Jonathan Ball, a virologist at the University of Nottingham. There’s often an intermediate species involved, like primates such as chimpanzees, but evidence shows people can get the virus directly from bats, he told BBC Inside Science.

But it is difficult for the virus to jump the species barrier from animals into humans, he adds. The virus first has to “somehow gain access to the cells in which it can replicate” by contact with infected blood.

Most people buy bushmeat from markets once it has already been cooked, so it is those hunting or preparing the raw meat that are at highest risk.

The current outbreak shows that, however difficult or rare it is, infection is clearly possible – though it must be remembered that each further infection, from Child Zero to today, has been caused by contact with an infected person.

Bitten and scratched

There has been talk of banning bushmeat, but that may simply drive it underground, experts have previously warned.

Hunting bushmeat is also a longstanding tradition, explains Dr Marcus Rowcliffe from the Zoological Society of London,

“It’s a meat-eating society – there’s a feeling that if you do not have meat every day, you haven’t properly eaten. Although you can get other forms of meat, there’s traditionally very little livestock production. It’s not so different from Europeans eating rabbits and deer.”

A Ghanaian vendor offers his catch known as ''bushmeat'' on route between Kumasi and Accra on 8 February 2008 Many West Africans eat bushmeat
Dried bush meat, at the Ajegunle-Ikorodu market in Lagos, Nigeria (13 August 2014) It is sold in markets across the region
Smoked bat carcasses for sale in GhanaMore than 100,000 bats are thought to be eaten in Ghana each year

In Ghana, for example, currently unaffected by the outbreak, fruit bats are widely hunted. To understand how people interact with this particular type of bushmeat, researchers surveyed nearly 600 Ghanaians about their practices relating to bats.

The study found that hunters used several different techniques to kill their prey including shooting, netting, scavenging and catapulting. All hunters reported handling live bats, which often meant they came into contact with blood and in some instances were bitten and scratched.

‘Healthy food’

These hunters are therefore the most at risk of contracting viruses present in bats, explains one of the authors, Dr Olivier Restif from the University of Cambridge.

The work also uncovered that the scale of the bat bushmeat trade in Ghana was much higher than previously thought, with more than 100,000 bats killed and sold every year.

“People who eat bat bushmeat are rarely aware of any potential risk associated with consumption. They tend to see it as healthy food,”…

More: http://www.bbc.com/news/health-29604204