Teams Like This
Peste des petits ruminants (PPR) is an extremely contagious viral disease that is spreading into new regions across the globe, causing devastating socio-economic losses and serious damage to the livelihoods, food security, and nutrition for millions of small-scale farmers and pastoralists. In Mongolia, the effects of the epidemic have been particularly dire. In August 2016, PPR killed thousands of head of livestock, despite widespread vaccination. The disease also impacted wildlife, killing more than 50 percent of the critically endangered Mongolian saiga antelope in less than two months. This catastrophic loss of wildlife also caused immediate consequences for other endangered animals, including snow leopards that depend on wild ungulates for food.
OUR APPROACH: Along with livestock health authorities, herders, biologists, wildlife health specialists, international aid organizations and conservation NGOs, the working group will seek new ideas to free the country’s wildlife, economy, and livelihoods from this disease, and explore options for integrated management of wildlife and livestock health.
- Produce a comprehensive report on the PPR outbreak at the wildlife-livestock interface in Mongolia, including its characteristics and drivers, by facilitating data sharing across livestock management, livestock health, wildlife health, and conservation sectors
- Develop a multi-criteria evaluation (MCE) to map the risk of disease transmissions and spread between livestock and wildlife using expert knowledge from livestock herders, government authorities, epidemiologists, biologists, and other stakeholders. Risk maps will support decisions surrounding the surveillance, management, and control of PPR in Mongolia
- Create a population and disease dynamics model to understand the long term behavior of PPR where wildlife and livestock interact to guide PPR eradication in Mongolia (and globally)
- Identify participatory approaches (e.g. reporting tools) to empower citizens to work with authorities as active participants in disease surveillance, control, and eradication
The circulation of PPR in Asia has grave consequences in wildlife populations already struggling with overhunting, poaching, livestock competition, and climatic events. We urgently need more PPR surveillance and wildlife protection measures.
In this piece, published by the CDC, the authors determine that the mass mortality of both wildlife and domestic ungulates was caused by the introduction of the peste des petits ruminants virus (PPRV).
The team published a framework that lays the foundation for eradicating PPRV in a five-year period by covering four major components.
Wildlife Conservation Society
Wildlife Conservation Society
Princeton University
The Nature Conservancy
Veterinary and Animal Breeding Agency, Ministry of Food, Agriculture & Light Industry
WWF Mongolia
UN Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO)
Dept of Environment & Natural Resources, Ministry of Environment & Tourism
Tufts University
Mongolian Academy of Sciences
Wildlife Conservation Society
Royal Veterinary College, University of London
French Agricultural Research for Development (CIRAD)