6th April 2020 Dear Dr Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus [Director General, World Health Organisation] and Dr Zhang Qi [Co-ordinator of Traditional and Complementary Medicine Unit (TCM), World Health Organisation], COVID-19: Health risks and wildlife[1] markets – the need for a permanent global ban on wildlife markets and a highly precautionary approach to …
Living with wild animals, Part One: Cash cows or fellow beings?
As we approach World Health Day on Tuesday, 7 April 2020 – please join the call to end wildlife markets/wildlife trade across the globe to protect human health, including re-emphasising the inherent human health risks of tuberculosis (TB) transmission from the lion bone trade. World-wide, TB has been infecting and killing …
Zoonotic Diseases of Mass Destruction
Banner image courtesy of artist Olaf Hajek and The New York Times Sunday Review The ‘true’ cost of wildlife abuse – Coronavirus and the viruses to follow…. “If we fail to understand and take care of the natural world, it can cause a breakdown of these systems and come back …
Botswana government won’t let the truth get in the way of its trophy hunting narrative
By Ross Harvey, Conservation Action Trust, 5 March 2020 Symptomatic of the Botswana government’s shaky relationship with reality is its letter to the United Kingdom’s Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA). A full week after the deadline (25 February 2020) for public submissions on whether the UK should ban …
“Unfair Game” – An exposé of South Africa’s captive-bred lion industry
“Unfair Game” – An exposé of South Africa’s captive-bred lion industry UK Link – “Unfair Game“ USA Link – “Unfair Game“ By Lord Ashcroft on Wildlife “In April 2019 Lord Ashcroft published the results of his year-long investigation into South Africa’s captive-bred lion industry. Over 11 pages of a single …
China’s ban on wildlife consumption is an overdue death knell for lion bone industry
by Don Pinnock, Daily Maverick, 24 February 2020 The Chinese government has placed an immediate ban on the illegal trading of wildlife and the consumption of wild animals. This follows a link between pangolin meat and the coronavirus outbreak. Despite international outrage, South Africa is allowing a quota of at …
UK Ivory Bill – Appeal
Banner Image – Protesters supporting the UK Ivory Bill being enacted in full outside the High Court, 24 February 2020 – courtesy of Action for Elephants Back in November 2019, Friends of Antique Cultural Treasures (FACT – a limited company formed by dealers and collectors, with funds channelled via …
Botswana auctions off the last of its big tusker elephants
By Ross Harvey, Conservation Action Trust, 14 February 2020 “Why not allow any willing bidder (such as the EMS Foundation) to pay for these licences if that raises revenue to conserve magnificent bull elephants instead of eliminating them?“ The Botswana government has again demonstrated to the world that it either does …
Inside The Global Conservation Organization Infiltrated By Trophy Hunters
In depth investigation by Roberto Jurkschat, “Inside The Global Conservation Organization Infiltrated By Trophy Hunters,” BuzzFeed, 13 February 2020 (see original text for all images and references) GENEVA — Giraffes may well tower over all other animals in the natural world — but in the wild, their numbers are rapidly dwindling, …
Lawsuit prompts shutdown of trophy hunters’ panel in Trump administration
In 2019, after IWCC members pressed for the lifting of prohibitions on imports of elephant and lion trophies from Tanzania, the USFWS issued an import permit for a lion trophy from that country, the first since the species was listed as threatened under the U.S. Endangered Species Act. Photo by …