NEW DELHI: As the Coronavirus scare continues, the Union Environment Ministry for the first time has come up with a detailed plan to check the spread of the infectious disease from birds/wild animals to humans with a proposal to establish National Centre for Avian Disease.
The centre will identify, monitor and observe zoonotic (spread between animals and human) diseases in wild birds at select locations in the country.
The ministry has also recommended developing Standard Operating Procedures for mitigating disease outbreaks in birds and identifying areas vulnerable to disease outbreaks in bird populations for future monitoring.
The ministry’s draft plan — titled Visionary perspective plan on Conservation of Avian Biodiversity, their Ecosystems, Habitats and Landscapes in the Country — aims to develop a national centre to study and monitor diseases in wild bird populations in the country.
“In 2016, WHO highlighted that 75 per cent of emerging infectious diseases were caused by pathogens originating from animals or products of animal origin. Considering this, surveillance and management of zoonotic and non-zoonotic diseases in wild birds should be prioritised in India,” it noted.
It highlights that recently, India has witnessed a catastrophic incidence of bird deaths (17,000) in Rajasthan.
“Incidences of diseases in wild animals have increased globally in the recent past. These include new, previously undefined diseases as well as existing diseases with new features. These new features may include the introduction of a disease to a new location or a new population. Developing countries such as India suffer disproportionately from the burden of infectious diseases,” said the draft.
The draft further said that newly emerging diseases and new zoonotic forms of known diseases of human and wild animals have led to the formulation of the ‘One Health’ programme.
Coronavirus
Coronaviruses (CoV) are a large family of viruses that cause illness ranging from the common cold to more severe diseases such as Middle East Respiratory Syndrome and Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome. A novel coronavirus (nCoV) is a new strain that has not been previously identified in humans.
Swine Flu
Swine flu, also known as the H1N1 virus, is a relatively new strain of an influenza virus that causes symptoms similar to the regular flu. It originated in pigs but is spread primarily from person to person.
SARS
SARS-CoV is thought to be an animal virus from an as-yet-uncertain animal reservoir, perhaps bats, that spread to other animals (civet cats) and first infected humans in the Guangdong province of southern China in 2002.
Middle East respiratory syndrome
The Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) is a viral respiratory disease caused by a novel coronavirus (Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus) that was first identified in Saudi Arabia in 2012. Mers appears to be less easily passed from human to human, but has greater lethality, killing 35% of about 2,500 people who have been infected.
Avian Flu
H5N1 is a type of influenza virus that causes a highly infectious, severe respiratory disease in birds called avian influenza (or “bird flu”). When people do become infected.
Ebola
Formerly known as Ebola haemorrhagic fever, Ebola virus disease is a rare but severe, often fatal illness in humans.
The virus is transmitted to people from wild animals and spreads in the human population through human-to-human transmission.