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Central Africa: Expert Blames Aids, Ebola to Bush Meat
Arusha - Consumption of bush meat may have fuelled the emergence of viral diseases including HIV/Aids and Ebola, among people in the Congo basin, a scientist warned yesterday.

Dr John B. Flynn, director of Usaid-supported Central Africa regional programme for the environment said there is evidence that HIV has been transmitted to humans by wild chimpanzees, one of the most hunted animals inthe Congo basin.

He told the last session of the 8th Sullivan Summit that medical researchers were concerned that bush meat trade could not only eliminate primate pupulations in the area, but could also spread HIV/Aids, Ebola, monkey fox and related hemorrhagic fevers.

He said although some populations of wild chimpanzees tolerated closely-related SIV virus with few harmful effects, medical researchers were concerned that bush meat trade would eliminate the endangered chimpanzees and other primates.

Should that happen, the potentially invaluable information that could have been provided by the on-going trials on the cure of Aids using primates would also disappear, the scientist further warned.

According to him, the pool of viruses resident in wildlife populations, especially the primates, has created substantial threat of zonotic diseases transmissions from animals to humans through active hunting and consumption of wildlife.

"The bush meat issue is thus an issue of global concern. It is one of the most severe threats to manyh large and medium sized mammals in Central African forests," he said, adding that bush meat has also found its way on the dining tables in town markets in the region.

Her said the dramatic reduction in mammal populations and the massive felling of trees could lead to ecological disruption of the complex ecosystem in the second largest tropical forest belt after the Amazon in South America.

The World Resources Institute, a Washington-based global organisation dealing with natural resources, estimates that about 50 per cent of Central Africa's forests, under which the Congo basin falls, are under logging leases.

"This means the commercial logging sector must be involved and cooperate in order to bring about forest conservation and sustainable use of the natural resources there," he pointed out.

The Congo basin contains about 20 per cent of the world's moist tropical forests. Although deforestation there is relatively low compared with other tropical zones, scientists say the forest loss there is substantial, corresponding to 21,668 square kilometres for a 10 year period.

The basin is believed to be the source of Africa's existing biological diversity. Of the estimated 8,000 plant species found there, about 80 per cent are endemic to the region, according to the expert.

"It is also the riches area for fauna in terms of numbers and level of endemism, with 655 species of birds and 58 species of mammals, about half of them endemic to the area," Dr Flynn explained, adding that of these, 16 bird species and 23 mammal species are considered threatened.

The region supports the world's largest population of lowland gorillas, chimpanzees, bonobos (pygmy chimpanzees) and forest elephants.

The Congo basin forest partnership was launched in 2002 in Johannesburg during the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) by the United States and South Africa along with 27 public and private partners to promote concervation of natural resources in Central African forests.

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