COVID-19 is a zoonotic disease. For the 200+ bats currently in wildlife rehabilitation facilities across Pennsylvania, this presents a threat. Eman Anis, a microbiologist with Penn Vet’s New Bolton Center, is leading a study to test for the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in North American bats, work being done with associate professors Lisa Murphy and Julie Ellis and Pennsylvania Game Commission biologist Greg Turner.
When wildlife biologist Matthew Schnupp began his career, the emphasis was on conserving habitat. “The paradigm of wildlife management for the last 20 years has been habitat management,” he says, aiming to conserve the land and ecosystems animals require to thrive.
Penn Vet and the Pennsylvania Game Commission (PGC) recently initiated the Pennsylvania Wildlife Futures Program (WFP), a new science-based, wildlife health program that will increase disease surveillance, management and innovative research aimed at better protecting wildlife across the Commonwealth.
White-nose syndrome has killed 99 percent of most cave-bat species.
Chronic wasting disease continues to spread to new parts of Pennsylvania, infecting and killing deer and threatening hunting tradition.
In August 2019, Penn Vet and the Game Commission announced the Pennsylvania Wildlife Futures Program, a new science-based, wildlife health program that will increase disease surveillance, management and research to better protect wildlife across the Commonwealth.