Wildlife Disease Association

COVID-19 Data

Wildlife trade pandemics and the law: Fighting this year’s pandemic with last year’s laws
A report from Legal Atlas, Eco Health and George Mason University
This report takes a critical look at what have nations already done with their laws that support the monitoring and prevention of disease emergence that comes from wildlife? In particular, it examines how ten different areas of law respond to this need and provides a summary of the legal challenges and the many opportunities for immediate action. Find the report HERE.

For information concerning specific recommendations / guidelines for the prevention of or surveillance for SARS-CoV-2 in wildlife species please check out our COVID-19 Resources HERE.

Recent News & Announcements

Statement from the Wildlife Disease Association on WHO-China Report on SARS-CoV-2 HERE.

Congratulations to Molly Martony!

Molly is the winner of the Wildlife Disease Association-International Association of Aquatic Animal Medicines joint award for the best aquatic animal manuscript published by a student in JWD in 2020. Molly’s paper, Esophageal measurement of core body temperature in the Florida manatee (Trichechus manatus latirostris), was published in the January 2020 edition, Volume 56(1): 27-33.For more information on this joint award go HERE.

Attention all researchers!

WDA and the crowdfunding site Experiment are partnering to run a Challenge grant for Wildlife Health and Disease. During the 2018 and 2019 challenge grants researchers raised more than $80,000. Find more information about this year’s challenge HERE

Calling all photographers
We know that there are some amazing photographers in our membership, so please help us out. The Journal of Wildlife Diseases and WDA will be launching new websites in the coming months and there are opportunities to add your pictures in many places not only on the website but in WDA promotional material as well. Currently the banner picture on the new JWD website is a stock photo, why not let us showcase your work. For a banner photo the size requirement is 1440 x 426 px .jpg image. We will make sure that you are clearly credited for your work. Not all photos needed are banner photos. We would also welcome high quality pictures of all of you supporting the mission of WDA and All One Health, All conservation and All Wildlife Disease, All the Time. And currently the diversity of WDA is not being adequately reflected in our photos, so please send us pictures of you and your colleagues doing awesome things for wildlife so we can fully showcase all of our members. Please email photos to: exec.manager@wildlifedisease.org.

Information on other grant opportunities for research can be found HERE

Information on WDA’s two Student Chapter Grants can be found HERE.

Who is WDA?

We are researchers, practitioners and educators! Please watch our video to learn more about us!

WDA Updates

Mark your Calendars! WDA will host a virtual week 30 August – 5, September 2020

Dear WDA colleagues,

COVID19 has sadly forced us to postpone our International Conference in Cuenca until 2021. However, I am certain you will all agree that in these last months more than ever before wildlife has been discussed here, there and everywhere! The topics of wildlife health, diseases and the links between wild animals, livestock and humans have made it to the media front pages, and forced many of us to put extra hours of work no matter where we are located.

I would argue it is therefore more than appropriate for our association to get together and take a short pause to discuss among other things, on what is happening in the different sections of our association, and how we can as a group continue to be a reference and a valued contributor to promote wildlife health across the globe.

With the help of technology, I would like to invite you all to join us for a virtual WDA week at the beginning of September. During this week, we are planning to host several events:

1. Our WDA Council meeting - the meeting will be held in two 3-hour blocks, Monday august 31st, and Tuesday September 1st both starting at 16:00 EDT (UCT/GMT - 4 hours).

2. WDA annual business meeting - the meeting will be held Thursday, September 3rd at 9 am EDT (UTC-4 hours). Not only will we discuss what is happening in WDA (some exciting news), but we will announce the winners of our two most prestigious awards, the Ed Adison Distinguished Service Award and the joint AAWV and WDA, Tom Thorne and Beth Williams Memorial Award.

3. Wildlife health across the world – each of our sections has been challenged to organize a 1hr session where they will bring 2 invited lecturers to present topics relevant to the respective section. These meetings will be open to all no matter where you are located and can be a short yet “teasing” chance to hear on what is keeping you colleagues across the globe so busy!

A calendar has been made to help you locate the different meetings and the times they take place. Please refer to the time zones columns to identify the correct time for you. Some may mean a late evening or a very early rise, but I have no doubts it will be worth it! The calendar can be accessed HERE.

These meetings will be hosted as ZOOM webinar and we will provide all with the links closer to the dates. More info on each “Wildlife health across the world” session will also be on our webpage in the coming days/week.

I look forward to meeting as many of you as possible during this week!

With my best regards,

Carlos das Neves

WDA President

2021 Annual International Conference

Virtual 69th Annual - 14th Biennial Joint Conference of the
Wildlife Disease Association & European Wildlife Disease Association
August 31 – September 2, 2021

Call for abstracts now open!
EXTENDED Deadline for submission: April 30, 2021

More information HERE.

WDA Continues to Support One Health

For more than 60 years Wildlife Disease Association has published what is now called One Health research, facilitated One Health solutions to wildlife conservation challenges, and promoted One Health education.

For over 30 years WDA's One Health mission has been to "acquire, disseminate, and apply knowledge of the health and diseases of wild animals in relation to their biology, conservation and ecology including interactions with humans and domestic animals”.

Most recently WDA's slogan says it all:
“WDA is all wildlife diseases, all conservation, all one health, all the time!"