[monkeywire] Study: Socializing Helped Ebola Wipe Out Gorillas
Kevin Walter
krw at jimmyhiggins.com
Mon Jul 10 12:34:30 EDT 2006
http://news.yahoo.com/s/nm/20060710/sc_nm/science_ebola_dc
Socializing Helped Ebola Wipe Out Gorillas - Study
July 10, 2006
Reuters
By Maggie Fox, Health and Science Correspondent
Social contact helped the Ebola virus virtually wipe out a population
of gorillas in the Democratic Republic of Congo, French researchers
reported on Monday.
A 2004 outbreak of the virus, which also kills people, killed 97
percent of gorillas who lived in groups and 77 percent of solitary
males, Damien Caillaud and colleagues from the University of
Montpellier and the University of Rennes in France reported.
Overall, it wiped out 95 percent of the gorilla population within a
year, they reported in the journal Current Biology.
"Thousands of gorillas have probably disappeared," they wrote.
The study shows that the deadly virus spreads directly from gorilla
to gorilla and does not necessarily depend on a still-unidentified
third species of animal, perhaps a bat, that can transmit the virus
without getting ill from it.
It also may shed light on how early humans evolved, they suggested.
The findings may show that pre-humans were slow to live in large
social groups because disease outbreaks could wipe out those who did.
Ebola hemorrhagic fever is one of the most virulent viruses ever
seen, killing between 50 percent and 90 percent of victims. The World
Health Organization says about 1,850 people have been infected and
1,200 have died since the Ebola virus was discovered in 1976.
WHO and other experts say people probably start outbreaks when they
hunt and butcher chimpanzees. The virus is transmitted in blood,
tissue and other fluids.
Caillaud's team said Ebola is a serious threat to the survival of
endangered gorillas and chimpanzees, along with hunting and the
destruction of the forests they live in.
The researchers documented one outbreak of Ebola and its effects on
gorillas and people in Odzala-Kokoua National Park.
"On October 13, 2003, two villagers from Mbandza hunting at an
undetermined site inside the park got contaminated and became index
cases of an outbreak that killed 29 people in seven weeks," they wrote.
They were able to identify 400 individual gorillas.
"Overall, 109 distinct gorilla social units visiting Lokoue were
reliably identified and monitored during a 1,360-day period."
By July 2004, nearly all the gorillas were dead. "Due to intra-group
transmission, the death rate was highest among gorillas living in
groups," the researchers wrote.
Health workers move in fast when Ebola breaks out among humans, to
isolate patients and to make sure everyone who has contact with them
wears protective clothing.
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