West Nile Virus Prevalent in Wildlife Near Urban Areas

Research Study Reveals Wild Mammals are Frequently Exposed to Disease

NEW YORK - June 17, 2008 - In a paper published by the leading scientific journal Emerging Infectious Diseases, scientists at Wildlife Trust reported on results from a recent study of West Nile virus seroprevalence in wild mammals living in and around urbanized areas. The study was conducted in the mid-Atlantic region of the U.S. and is the first-of-its-kind research focusing on West Nile virus exposure in wild mammals in a spatially-explicit context.

The research shows that several common peridomestic wild mammal species are frequently exposed to West Nile virus and identifies factors that influence exposure rates, including age and date of capture. It also shows that West Nile virus transmission intensity is higher in human-dominated areas. Evidence of exposure to West Nile virus has been found in a wide variety of domestic and wild mammals including rodents, ungulates, carnivores, bats and primates.

Andres Gomez, a doctoral fellow with Wildlife Trust and leading author of the article said "this study provides several insights into the ecology of transmission of West Nile virus in mammals. We demonstrate that mammal exposure shows significant variation in space and time, which is a critical requirement for using wild mammals as sentinels of human infection risk."

"West Nile virus was introduced into the western hemisphere in New York in 1999. It has since spread across the USA, into Canada, Mexico and some South American countries causing many human fatalities.

It is known that West Nile virus infects a range of bird species and a previous study showed that some avian species suffered severe declines," said Dr. Alonso Aguirre, Vice President for Conservation Medicine and research advisor on the study.