An investigation into the deaths of 20 elephants in Hwange National Park has suggested that they could have died of a disease called hemorrhagic septic-aemia.<\/p>\n
The contagious bacterial disease affects cattle and water buffaloes with a high mortality rate in infected animals.<\/p>\n
The Director-General of Parks and Wildlife Management Authority of Zimbabwe Fulton Mangwanya told Parliament on Monday while giving oral evidence that the diseasecan cause massive deaths. He said:<\/p>\n
The results, to date, point to cause of elephant deaths in Zimbabwe being a disease known as hemorrhagic septic-aemia. It has been reported to kill Asian elephants in India. It also affects cattle, pigs and chicken in Southern Africa, in which species it can cause massive mortalities.<\/p>\n
The disease is said to have killed over 200 000 saiga antelopes in Khazakhstan in 2015.<\/p>\n
Elephants have over the years been attracting large numbers of local and foreign tourists hence they are a major revenue source for Zimbabwe.<\/p>\n
Meanwhile, authorities have been expressing concern over the ever-increasing number of elephants saying they are now unable to contain the herds.<\/p>\n
International laws governing the sell and management of wildlife has restricted Zimbabwe from selling the elephants.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
An investigation into the deaths of 20 elephants in Hwange National Park has suggested that they could have died of a disease called hemorrhagic septic-aemia. The contagious bacterial disease affects cattle and water buffaloes with a high mortality rate in infected animals. The Director-General of Parks and Wildlife Management Authority of Zimbabwe Fulton Mangwanya told […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":84,"featured_media":15215,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,7],"tags":[781,546],"class_list":["post-28282","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-all-news","category-files","tag-african-elephants","tag-hwange"],"yoast_head":"\n