How fight against Ebola can save our game

That Kenya is among 20 countries in Africa that are ill-prepared to deal with an Ebola outbreak makes it imperative to do more to avert potential deaths.

According to the World Health Organisation (WHO), only Algeria and Ethiopia in Africa are fully prepared to deal with Ebola.

Several countries, including Kenya, have been found to have weaknesses in surveillance and health systems to cope with an Ebola outbreak.

The interaction between wild animals and humans has been linked to Ebola, yet this connection seems to have been overlooked by the efforts to control Ebola.

Admittedly, the country has expended resources on international air travel control and surveillance, which is justified.

Without seeming to cause unwarranted hysteria or downplay ongoing anti-Ebola efforts, the current Ebola outbreak might just be the right moment for Kenya to focus on the public health risks posed by bush meat consumption.

This is because human handling and consumption of bush meat has been cited as a major source of zoonotic diseases in Africa.

For one to appreciate the magnitude of the problem, reference can be made to a recent report; Lifting the Siege: Securing Kenya's Wildlife by the Ambassador Nehemiah Rotich-led Task Force on Wildlife Security.

The task force found that  bush meat poaching in Kenya has hit unprecedented levels, emerging as a multi-billion shilling industry.

The report indicates that a vehicle was impounded on the Narok-Mai Mahiu road in February with 6,000 kgs of bush meat, which, if sold at Sh200 per kilogram, amounts to Sh1.2 million.

Further, it is estimated that in Tsavo alone, 3,000 animals are killed yearly, yielding about 643,950kg of wet meat.

The bush meat hotspot areas include Narok, Naivasha, Isiolo, Samburu, Machakos, Kitengela, Namanga and the Coast.

The report says the problem is so serious that it is posing a challenge to conservation, and seriously affecting tourism in Kenya's key national parks.

Thus, residents of Nairobi and other major urban areas have reason to worry about the meat they consume.

Although bush meat has long been part of local consumption, it is no longer sustainable, nor healthy.

It is ironical that even after WHO declared the epidemic a "public health emergency of international concern", bush meat merchants are still in thriving business.

The meat joints along Nakuru-Naivasha Highway and the dealers' major urban areas don't seem to care about the health risks, leave alone the devastating effects on tourism.

Ebola is the latest of the many recent epidemics and falls under the category of emerging zoonotic diseases, which start in animal populations and jump to humans.

Those who often hunt, trade in or eat bush meat are vulnerable to infection.
Bubonic Plague, Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS), and Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) are some of the zoonotic diseases.

The worldwide increase in incidence of zoonotic disease has been attributed to human settlement in areas where animal populations and parasites were previously isolated from humans and from the increase in ownership of domesticated animals.

Scientists have identified Ebola as one of the zoonotic diseases that infect both animals and human.

This implies that prospects of campaigns against illegal bush meat trade and consumption have never seemed brighter.

That might be the silver lining in the Ebola outbreak. The outbreak should serve as a warning shot to bush meat consumers and handlers in Kenya.

WHO has described the epidemic as one of the most challenging since the virus was first identified in 1976 in what is now the Democratic Republic of Congo. No medicine or vaccine exists yet for Ebola.

In Africa, infection has been documented from handling infected chimpanzees, gorillas, fruit bats, monkeys, forest antelope and porcupines.