COVID-19 Disease Ecology Global Health

Is COVID-19 infecting wild animals? We’re testing species from bats to seals to find out

By Jonathan Runstadler, Tufts University and Kaitlin Sawatzki, Tufts University Cover image: Peter Trimming via Wikipedia, CC BY-SA Over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, researchers have found coronavirus infections in pet cats and dogs and in multiple zoo animals, including big cats and gorillas. These infections have even happened when staff were using personal […]

Global Health Perspectives Science and Culture

The Indignity of Expertise

How our reflexive mistrust of authority hurts America By E.E. Robakis Defiance is a deeply American trait, rendered, for better or worse, into a national pastime. Americans are chronically, debilitatingly anti-authority; this has deep roots in the colonization of North America by Europeans and the establishment of this country as a “safe haven” from tyrannical […]

Animal Care Animal Welfare Wildlife Rehabilitation

Fires in Bolivia Threaten Wildlife Sanctuary

By Milan Sime Martinic Banner Photo: Fire at Ambue Ari. Courtesy of CIWY. More than 120 major fires have been detected in Bolivia’s Amazon rainforest and dry forests of Chiquitano since March, according to the nonprofit Monitoring of the Andean Amazon Project (MAAP). One of these fires is now threatening an animal sanctuary in Guarayos, […]

COVID-19 Science and Culture

Coronavirus responses highlight how humans are hardwired to dismiss facts that don’t fit their worldview

The same facts will sound different to people depending on what they already believe. By Adrian Bardon, Professor of Philosophy, Wake Forest University Bemoaning uneven individual and state compliance with public health recommendations, top U.S. COVID-19 adviser Anthony Fauci recently blamed the country’s ineffective pandemic response on an American “anti-science bias.” He called this bias […]

COVID-19 Disease Ecology Global Health

As Covid-19 Crisis Continues, UNEP and Global Partners Release 10-Point Plan to Prevent the Next Pandemic

“The science is clear that if we keep exploiting wildlife and destroying our ecosystems, then we can expect to see a steady stream of these diseases jumping from animals to humans in the years ahead.” By Jessica Corbett, Common Dreams “Climate change is a force of growing importance that influences the future geographic distribution and […]

Vet examines spider monkey
Animal Care Wildlife Conservation Wildlife Rehabilitation

From Puppies to Primates: A Veterinarian’s Path to Saving Wildlife

By Ben Lybarger Back in 2018, I shared a dorm room in Bolivia with a veterinary surgeon from Italy, and at times also a baby macaw or squirrel monkey that he would wake up every couple of hours to feed. His name was Cristian Tirapelle, and we were both working with Comunidad Inti Wara Yassi (CIWY) at […]