Respiratory Diseases in Mountain Gorillas

On 9 July this year, in a piece headed "Gorilla deaths show tourists should keep their distance", the New Scientist published an article to the effect that poaching is the most important cause of death for mountain gorillas, and respiratory diseases like influenza or parainfluenza come second. The report was based on an abstract presented at the annual meeting of the Wildlife Disease Association and a subsequent interview. "The Mountain Gorilla Veterinary Project (MGVP), based in Ruhengeri, Rwanda," the article stated, "investigated 100 gorilla deaths dating back to 1968. The team found that 40 were due to trauma, for which poaching is almost always the cause in adults. More surprising was the detrimental effect of respiratory diseases, including influenza A and parainfluenza viruses, which killed 24 of the animals. In a bid to cut the risk of people passing these diseases on, eco-tourists who trek to see the gorillas in the wild already have to stay at least 7 m away, and keep their visits to no more than an hour."
Subsequently, this story has been widely reported in the international press. It occasioned a response from the MGVP, which was published on the New Scientist website (http://www.newscientist.com/article.ns?id=mg18725074.500) and in the print magazine, saying that the information had been misrepresented: while it is true that trauma was the most common cause of death, "only part of that was attributed to poaching," and that there was "no evidence" of any deaths from influenza or parainfluenza viruses, although it is indeed "possible" that such viruses are present in the population. In a different abstract, MGVP presented data showing that some mountain gorillas are seropositive (i.e. have antibiodies) against influenza, parainfluenza and other viruses, or at least viruses very closely related to those. Lastly, they took issue with the headline itself, saying that "nothing in [their] study implies that tourism poses any additional health risk to gorillas" and that tourism is essential as an incentive for the gorillas' conservation, but it must "continue to be very strictly controlled." MGVP is preparing a publication that will discuss this study in detail. The mountain gorilla population is the only population of great apes whose numbers are increasing in the wild.

Diseases overview

Homepage