A zoonotic disease is a disease that can be transmitted from animals to humans. Presently, SARS-CoV-1 is the zoonotic disease that has plagued the world for the past few years but these types of diseases are not new to us. In the past, some examples of zoonotic diseases include the West Nile virus, anthrax, rabies, and H1N1. There’s a good chance that there are a lot of undiscovered zoonotic diseases out there since the majority of mammals are quite similar in terms of structure and function; meaning we are more prone to undiscovered bacteria, viruses, and parasites than we’d normally expect.
With the loss of biodiversity, it is speculated that these diseases are more likely than ever to emerge from the shadows. The prevalence of infectious diseases are due to many varying factors, of the few, as human population and land utilization begin to grow, the interactions between animals and humans increase since the dilution effect decreases from loss of natural habitat forcing animals to infringe into so called ‘human territory’. A common example seen in Canada are the encroachment of bears on private properties. Additionally, the amplification effect increases as the exponential growth of the human population in the past few decades continues to grow. This is not to be taken lightly; if the human population comes into contact with a frequency dependent disease, the rate of transmission is high due to high human to human interaction on a daily basis – as well documents with common diseases cuz as the common cold or the flu, and more recently the Coronavirus.
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References:
Keesing, Holt, R. D., & Ostfeld, R. S. (2006). Effects of species diversity on disease risk. Ecology Letters, 9(4), 485–498. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1461-0248.2006.00885.x
Rubio, Fredes, F., & Simonetti, J. A. (2016). Links Between Land-Sharing, Biodiversity, and Zoonotic Diseases: A Knowledge Gap. EcoHealth, 13(4), 607–608. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10393-016-1171-3
Applied Plant Ecology Winter 2020 