🌅 How Vultures Protect Human Health

SOURCE

Frank & Sudarshan (2023)

WHAT TO KNOW

• An estimated 100,000 people in India died each year from 2000 to 2005 after the vulture population fell by as much as 99% beginning in the mid-1990s. The cause turned out to be a painkiller given to livestock that happened to be toxic to vultures, taking their population across South Asia down from around 50 million to just thousands in a short period of time.

WHY IT MATTERS

• Vultures are apex scavengers that feed exclusively on carrion—the rotting flesh of dead animals—and can clean an entire cow carcass in just 40 minutes. The researchers found that without the birds scavenging dead livestock in certain Indian districts, the bacteria within carrion can proliferate and spread to humans through close contact or water contamination. Experts say the study is one of the clearest examples of how scavengers impact human health and reduce the burden of disease.

CONNECT THE DOTS

• Vultures aren’t the only scavengers facing population decline: a new study by researchers at Stanford University found 36% of the world’s scavenger populations are currently threatened or in decline, including a disproportionate share of apex scavengers, the loss of which poses a significant risk to human health. The team found habitat loss, livestock production, and poaching are driving the decline.