Bats as Bushmeat in Ghana
type: CreativeWork
description: Despite major advances in vaccines, antibiotics and antiviral treatments, infectious diseases still kill 15 million people around the world each year - one quarter of global deaths (Fauci and Morens, 2012). Emerging diseases, caused by new or newly expanding pathogens, form a rapidly changing and intensely challenging front of this international battle. Pathogens that can jump from animals into humans, known as zoonoses, cause over 65% of emerging diseases; three quarters of zoonoses originate in wildlife (Jones et al., 2008). One of the most common sources of human-wildlife contact is through hunting wild animals for food. Researchers have estimated that western and central Africans alone harvest five million tons of bushmeat annually (Fa et al., 2002; Ntiamoa-Baidu, 1998). This massive industry raises concerns across disciplines: not only do epidemiologists fear for the transmission of zoonotic diseases (Daszak, 2000), but conservationists fear for the depletion of threatened and endangered species (Milner-Gulland and Bennett, 2003) and development practitioners worry for the welfare of the communities and people that depend on wild meat for protein and income (Davies, 2002). Of the many animals hunted for bushmeat, bats pose a number of unanswered questions. Hosting almost sixty viruses that can or do infect humans (Wong et al., 2007), bats globally also are suffering severe population declines due to overhunting (Streubig et al., 2007; Harrison et al., 2011). Yet their roles as reservoirs of human disease, as sources of valuable products, and in human culture are all understudied and largely unexplained. The newly identified presence of henipavirus antibodies and $\textit{Bartonella}$ bacteria in $\textit{Eidolon helvum}$ fruit bats in Ghana, as well as the potential for commercial hunting of fruit bats, led me to this project in Ghana, West Africa. I set out to: (1) delineate ways in which bats and their pathogens may come into contact with humans; (2) understa…
abstract: Despite major advances in vaccines, antibiotics and antiviral treatments, infectious diseases still kill 15 million people around the world each year - one quarter of global deaths (Fauci and Morens, 2012). Emerging diseases, caused by new or newly expanding pathogens, form a rapidly changing and intensely challenging front of this international battle. Pathogens that can jump from animals into humans, known as zoonoses, cause over 65% of emerging diseases; three quarters of zoonoses originate in wildlife (Jones et al., 2008). One of the most common sources of human-wildlife contact is through hunting wild animals for food. Researchers have estimated that western and central Africans alone harvest five million tons of bushmeat annually (Fa et al., 2002; Ntiamoa-Baidu, 1998). This massive industry raises concerns across disciplines: not only do epidemiologists fear for the transmission of zoonotic diseases (Daszak, 2000), but conservationists fear for the depletion of threatened and endangered species (Milner-Gulland and Bennett, 2003) and development practitioners worry for the welfare of the communities and people that depend on wild meat for protein and income (Davies, 2002). Of the many animals hunted for bushmeat, bats pose a number of unanswered questions. Hosting almost sixty viruses that can or do infect humans (Wong et al., 2007), bats globally also are suffering severe population declines due to overhunting (Streubig et al., 2007; Harrison et al., 2011). Yet their roles as reservoirs of human disease, as sources of valuable products, and in human culture are all understudied and largely unexplained. The newly identified presence of henipavirus antibodies and $\textit{Bartonella}$ bacteria in $\textit{Eidolon helvum}$ fruit bats in Ghana, as well as the potential for commercial hunting of fruit bats, led me to this project in Ghana, West Africa. I set out to: (1) delineate ways in which bats and their pathogens may come into contact with humans; (2) understa…
author: Kamins, Alexandra
language: en
keywords: Bats, Ghana, Bushmeat
license: https://apollo8-f-pro.lib.cam.ac.uk/bitstreams/62a95a88-2dcc-4868-954b-ce831c98b358/download
license: https://www.rioxx.net/licenses/all-rights-reserved/
date published: 2012-12-10
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:24:23Z
provider: Cambridge University
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Cambridge

PropertyValue
property ID: DOI
value: 10.17863/CAM.92518