Livestock-Associated Anthrax Outbreaks in Wild Herbivores in Mago National Park (MNP), Ethiopia: One Health Perspective

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Abstract In Ethiopia, anthrax is a relatively common livestock disease, with individual wildlife cases occurring occasionally but rarely reported. It is an endemic, prioritized and immediately notifiable disease. Between 1999 and 2019, anthrax outbreaks were documented, affecting thousands of livestock and humans, with two epidemic events in wildlife, in the month of September in 1999 associated with livestock and in 2000 without cases in livestock or humans. Over a period of two months in 1999, a total of 1617 deaths were recorded in 21 species of wild animals and 95% of these were in lesser kudu ( Tragelaphus imberbis ). A number of livestock mortalities in 1999 were reported adjacent to, but outside, MNP. During the second outbreak in 2000 over the same period of the year, there were a total of 563 deaths of 8 wildlife species with lesser kudu again mostly affected (94%). In 1999, twenty people from pastoral communities in the local area, who ate and handled livestock and wildlife carcasses, including one scout, became sick with severe skin lesions, but all recovered after treatment. Laboratory investigation confirmed the cause of animal death was from fulminating infection with Bacillus anthracis . The disease events in MNP triggered multi-stakeholder participation in the outbreak investigation and diagnosis and in the control measures that were applied. This case study briefly reviews the background of anthrax in Ethiopia and available data from these two anthrax outbreaks in humans and domestic and wild animals and discusses the challenges, costs, and benefits of applying a One Health approach in and around MNP. Information © The Authors 2024