Zoonoses

• Experts says, the coronavirus outbreak comes from the animal world. It is a human activity that enabled the virus to jump to people, and specialists are warning that if nothing changes, many other pandemics of this nature will follow.

About:

• The name given to diseases transmitted from animals to humans is “zoonoses”, based on the Greek words for “animal” and “sickness”.

• They are not new — tuberculosis, rabies, toxoplasmosis, malaria, to name just a few, are all zoonoses.

• According to the UN Environment Programme (UNEP), 60% of human infectious diseases originate from animals. This figure climbs to 75% for “emerging” diseases such as Ebola, HIV, avian flu, Zika, or SARS, another type of coronavirus. The list goes on.

• The emergence of zoonotic diseases is often associated with environmental changes or ecological disturbances, such as agricultural intensification and human settlement, or encroachments into forests and other habitats.