Anthrax threatens wild apes

As if hunting and habitat loss weren't enough, the remaining wild populations of apes are threatened by infectious disease. 

As they describe in a report in the research journal Nature, Heinz Ellerbrok of the Robert Koch-Institut, Berlin, Germany, and colleagues have been investigating an unusually high number of sudden deaths among wild chimpanzees (Pan troglodytes verus) in the Taï National Park, Ivory Coast, Africa. 

The anthrax bacterium Bacillus anthracis appears to have been the cause of death for at least six individuals, even though tropical rainforest is not a habitat previously associated with anthrax. The results suggest that epidemic diseases represent substantial threats to wild ape populations, the researchers say, as well as posing a hazard to human health through the eating of chimpanzee meat.