Canadian wildlife health surveillance—patterns, challenges and opportunities identified by a scoping review

The protection and promotion of healthy wildlife populations is emerging as a shared goal among stakeholders in the face of unprecedented environmental threats. Accordingly, there are growing demands for the generation of actionable wildlife health information. Wildlife health surveillance is a connected system of knowledge that generates data on a range of factors that influence health. Canada recently approved the Pan-Canadian Approach to Wildlife Health that describes challenges facing wildlife health programs and provides a path forward for modernizing our approach. This scoping review was undertaken to describe the range of peer-reviewed Canadian wildlife health surveillance literature within the context of the challenges facing wildlife health programs and to provide a quantitative synthesis of evidence to establish baselines, identify gaps, and inform areas for growth. This review describes patterns related to species, location, authorship/funding, objectives, and methodology. Five areas are identified that have the potential to propel the field of wildlife health: representativeness, expanded/diversified collaboration, community engagement, harmonization, and a shift to a solutions-focused and One Health mindset. This scoping review provides a synopsis of 10 years of Canadian wildlife health surveillance, challenges us to envision the future of successful wildlife health surveillance, and provides a benchmark from which we can measure change.

Association of Zoonotic Protozoan Parasites With Microplastics in Seawater: Implications for Human and Wildlife Health

Plastics are widely recognized as a pervasive marine pollutant. Microplastics have been garnering increasing attention due to reports documenting their ingestion by animals, including those intended for human consumption. Their accumulation in the marine food chain may also pose a threat to wildlife that consume species that can accumulate microplastic particles. Microplastic contamination in marine ecosystems has thus raised concerns for both human and wildlife health. Our study addresses an unexplored area of research targeting the interaction between plastic and pathogen pollution of coastal waters. We investigated the association of the zoonotic protozoan parasites Toxoplasma gondii, Cryptosporidium parvum, and Giardia enterica with polyethylene microbeads and polyester microfibers. These pathogens were chosen because they have been recognized by the World Health Organization as underestimated causes of illness from shellfish consumption, and due to their persistence in the marine environment. We show that pathogens are capable of associating with microplastics in contaminated seawater, with more parasites adhering to microfiber surfaces as compared with microbeads. Given the global presence of microplastics in fish and shellfish, this study demonstrates a novel pathway by which anthropogenic pollutants may be mediating pathogen transmission in the marine environment, with important ramifications for wildlife and human health.

OCORRÊNCIA DO VÍRUS DA RAIVA NA POPULAÇÃO SELVAGEM DE SAGUIS CALLITHRIX GEOFFROYI (HUMBOLDT, 1812) NO SUDESTE DO BRASIL

Background: Zoonosis, which causes acute and lethal encephalitis, is transmitted through the inoculation of the virus present in the saliva of mammals of several species. In Brazil, wild rabies is a challenge for epidemiological surveillance and a significant increase has already been observed in human cases. Some of the main wild reservoirs are: wild dog (Cerdocyon thous), marmosets (Callithrix sp) and hematophagous bats (Desmodus rotundus). Considering cases of positivity in marmosets in the Northeast of Brazil, together with the increasing number of cases in wild animals, this work aimed to survey the occurrence of the virus in a wild population. The animals were necropsied from the tramway ES-060, all of the Callithrix geoffroyi. The material collected for analysis of the rabies virus consisted of brain, which was conditioned and identified for later analysis at the Institute of Agricultural and Forest Defense of Espírito Santo (IDAF). The 44 samples gave negative results. The study suggests that the occurrence of the virus should be investigated in other localities, especially in regions closer to sites that have already been reported cases of rabies, and that the use of trampled animals is feasible for a better understanding of wildlife health.

Molecular Detection of Tick-Borne Pathogens in American Bison (Bison bison) at El Uno Ecological Reserve, Janos, Chihuahua, Mexico

American bison (Bison bison) is listed as near-threatened and in danger of extinction in Mexico. Recent studies have demonstrated the presence of several emerging pathogens at the Janos Biosphere Reserve (JBR), inhabited by one wild herd of American bison. Blood samples were collected from 26 American bison in the JBR. We tested for the presence of Anaplasma marginale, Babesia bigemina, B. bovis, Borrelia burgdorferi sensu lato, and Rickettsia rickettsii DNA using nested and semi-nested PCR protocols performing duplicates in two different laboratories. Results showed three animals (11.5%) positive for B. burgdorferi s. l., three more (11.5%) for Rickettsia rickettsii, and four (19.2%) for B. bovis. Two individuals were co-infected with B. burgdorferi s. l. and B. bovis. We found no animals positive for A. marginale and B. bigemina. This is the first report in America of R. rickettsii in American bison. American bison has been described as an important reservoir for pathogens of zoonotic and veterinary importance; thus, the presence of tick-borne pathogen DNA in the JBR American bison indicates the importance of continuous wildlife health surveys.

Agricultural Fast Food: Bats Feeding in Banana Monocultures Are Heavier but Have Less Diverse Gut Microbiota

Habitat alteration for agriculture can negatively affect wildlife physiology and health by decreasing diet diversity and increasing exposure to agrochemicals for animals foraging in altered landscapes. Such negative effects may be mediated by the disruption of the gut microbiota (termed dysbiosis), yet evidence for associations between habitat alteration, wildlife health, and the gut microbiota remains scarce. We examine the association between management intensity of banana plantations and both the body condition and gut microbiota composition of nectar-feeding bats Glossophaga soricina, which commonly forage within banana plantations across Latin America. We captured and measured 196 bats across conventional monocultures, organic plantations, and natural forests in Costa Rica, and quantified gut microbiome bacterial phylogenetic diversity using 16S rRNA amplicon sequencing. We found that gut microbiota from bats foraging in conventional monocultures were overall less phylogenetically diverse than those from bats foraging in organic plantations or natural forests, both of which were characterized by diverse bacterial assemblages and individualized microbiota. Despite lower diversity, co-occurrence network complexity was higher in conventional monocultures, potentially indicating altered microbial interactions in agricultural landscapes. Bats from both organic and conventional plantations tended to be larger and heavier than their forest counterparts, reflecting the higher food supply. Overall, our study reveals that whilst both conventional monocultures and organic plantations provide a reliable food source for bats, conventional monocultures are associated with less diverse and potentially dysbiotic microbiota, whilst organic plantations promote diverse and individualized gut microbiota akin to their natural forest-foraging counterparts. Whilst the long-term negative effects of anthropogenically-altered microbiota are unclear, our study provides further evidence from a novel perspective that organic agricultural practices are beneficial for wildlife health.

How to Start Up a National Wildlife Health Surveillance Programme

Whilst multiple countries in Europe have wildlife health surveillance (WHS) programmes, they vary in scope. In many countries, coordinated general surveillance at a national scale is not conducted and the knowledge of wildlife health status in Europe remains limited. Learning lessons from countries with established systems may help others to effectively implement WHS schemes. In order to facilitate information exchange, the WHS Network of the European Wildlife Disease Association organised a workshop to both collate knowledge and experience from countries that had started or expanded WHS programmes and to translate this information into practical recommendations. Presentations were given by invited representatives of European countries with different WHS levels. Events that led to the start-up and fostered growth spurts of WHS were highlighted, including action plan creation, partnership formation, organisation restructuring and appraisal by external audit. Challenges to programme development, such as a lack of funding, data sharing, infrastructural provision and method harmonisation, were explored. Recommendations to help overcome key challenges were summarised as: understanding and awareness; cross-sectoral scope; national-scale collaboration; harmonisation of methods; government support; academic support; other funding support; staff expertise and capacity; leadership, feedback and engagement; and threat mitigation and wildlife disease management. This resource may enable the development of WHS programmes in Europe and beyond.

On the Effects of Balun on Small Antennas Performance for Animal Health- Monitoring and Tracking

This paper presents the performance evaluation of a sleeve Balun integration in the design of a flexible loop antenna for wildlife health monitoring and tracking applications. To verify the design concept, an experimental antenna is designed, fabricated, and measured in free-space and muscle mimicking phantom. Moreover, investigations are carried out for wearable and implanted antennas in planar and conformal arrangements. In free-space, the antenna is operating within the industrial, scientific, and medical ISM 5.8 GHz band. Balun integration in the antenna design efficiently chokes the currents excited on the outer surface of the feeding cable and provides a good impedance match between antenna and feed line, as demonstrated by simulation and measurement results. On the other hand, in phantom, the antenna has a wide bandwidth characteristic that covers the most used frequency bands for in-body devices. Balun integration, in this case, showed a negligible effect on antenna’s matching properties for two studied implantation depths; 2.5 cm and 5 cm. The proposed study offers a promising guideline in the design and realization of wearable and implanted antennas.

Detection and analysis of tick-borne infections in communal dogs of northwest Zimbabwe

Domestic dogs (Canis familiaris) may serve as a reservoir or a sentinel for infectious disease pathogens that can affect human and wildlife health. To understand the role of tick-borne diseases in rural and lesser developed regions, we investigated the prevalence of several tick-borne pathogens in communal dogs of Zimbabwe. Blood samples from 225 dogs in northwest Zimbabwe were assessed by serology for Ehrlichia canis, Anaplasma phagocytophilum and Borrelia burgdorferi, and 241 samples were assessed by polymerase chain reaction (PCR) for Ehrlichia. There was a high seroprevalence (73%) of E. canis-specific antibodies in domestic dogs in northwest Zimbabwe, but follow up analyses via PCR and genetic sequencing indicated only 7.5% of the canines were actively infected with the organism. Whilst indicating that an organism serologically related to E. canis is likely present in the region, this data also shows that the organism is currently present in a relative minority of the domestic dogs in the region. Its presence as evidenced by both serologic and PCR analysis is significant because of the ‘one health’ paradigm, where humans and wildlife may be affected by the exposure to this pathogen in domestic dogs.