Vaccinating the World's Top Predators May Be the Only Way to Save Them

http://motherboard.vice.com/read/vaccinating-the-worlds-top-predators-may-be-the-only-way-to-save-them

by DiabloD3 • 11 years ago

45 47 11 years ago

motherboard.vice.com

ForHackernews2• 11 years ago

Wait, but what if the lions get autism?

Raphmedia• 11 years ago

A tiger with down syndrome made the news a while back.

http://www.pbh2.com/wtf/meet-kenny-an-inbred-white-tiger/

ForHackernews2• 11 years ago

That's really sad. :*(

freshyill• 11 years ago

Except that Down syndrome isn't the result of inbreeding. Down syndrome is a very specific genetic disorder.

That's a dumbed-down explanation from a third-rate viral site, which exists solely to generate clicks from Facebook, and not an actual medical or scientific description of the tiger's condition.

swamp40• 11 years ago

People have suggested that Grumpy Cat might have a feline version of Down Syndrome as well.

Edit: It looks like the very definition of Down Syndrome (three copies of the 21st chromosome instead of two) doesn't really allow for an "animal version", since the 21st chromosome is specific to humans.

viame• 11 years ago

Looks like a hyenaiger to me.

sswaner• 11 years ago

Maybe NOT vaccinating any of us real top predators may be the best way to save the rest of the predators.

enupten4• 11 years ago

Very sad, and yet, sadder still is that we don't see ourselves for the locusts we've come to be.

civilian3• 11 years ago

So, have you got a solution?

enupten4• 11 years ago

I don't, really; the obvious one of using unregulated power, bring in far too much chaos, and hence useless.

I'm actually surprised that this view is so unpopular here...

ars• 11 years ago

They should do it.

Almost every extinction I've read about was caused at the end by an infection of some kind (fungus, parasite, virus, etc). Sure there might have been other factors that weakened the animal or plant, but the nail in the coffin seemed to always be an infection.

Hunting and other animal predators can massively reduce the numbers, but extinct to zero almost always seemed to me to be an infection at end. Without that they seem to hold on at low numbers, but not gone.

asciimo• 11 years ago

That may have been true before human beings conquered the Earth. Here are sixty more recent extinctions: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Category:Species_made_extinct_b...

enupten4• 11 years ago

Brace yourself for the HN downvotes!

joshuapants2• 11 years ago

Could vaccinating these animals effect evolution in some way? Species have to die out for new species to come to the forefront; is it right for us to try and change that? My impulse is to say, "Yes, vaccinate them and hopefully eradicate this virus," but there is always that second thought.

SapphireSun• 11 years ago

What do you think is the downside? Affecting evolution is kind of the point (we don't want them to go extinct).

joshuapants2• 11 years ago

What would be the downside of having dinosaurs around? What would be the downside of me being a Homo habilis and carving this message into the side of a large rock?

Whenever humans meddle with the environment there are drastic unintended consequences. I get it, they're charismatic animals and that's probably why I'm being downvoted, but I don't think this is a particularly unreasonable dissenting opinion.

Mz12• 11 years ago

I am kind of moderately anti-vax, but reading the article makes me feel this is worth a shot because of this:

Previous attempts to control the spread of CDV into wild populations focused on stopping the virus at the presumed source—domestic dogs. Unfortunately, research now shows that top predators are probably contracting CDV from smaller wild animals that act as intermediaries. The simplest solution, then—ensuring that humans vaccinate their pets—may no longer be an effective option.

Edit: So admitting to being moderately anit-vax is adequate reason for being downvoted to hell, even though it was given as a qualifier to strengthen my statement that this plan to vaccinate big cats sounds like it has merit.

Wow.

mc322• 11 years ago

I'm curious what is the basis for being anti-vax? Is there science behind that notion? To me it appears irrational, but I'm up for an alternative take out of curiosity.

Sometimes I wonder why people with this conviction dont just move to locations of low vaccination. I hear places in SE Asia, some parts of Africa have low vaccination rates, more out of poverty than conviction, but low rates non the less

Mz12• 11 years ago

I have a deadly, incurable medical condition for which an annual flu vax is routinely prescribed. I was diagnosed late in life, just before I turned 36. Doctors told me bluntly "People like you don't get well. Symptom management is the name of the game." But it is genetic, so I was born with it, so I felt strongly that now that we knew why I was always sickly, we should be able to do a better job of dealing with my health than the years before that when I knew something wasn't right but did not know what and doctors acted like I was a hypochondriac.

In part due to happenstance, in part because doctors were not really doing much for me, I sort of fell into a lot of alternative med stuff. I began getting gradually healthier, even though I had spent a year at death's door. All of the people who were actually helping me get stronger while doctors wrote me off for dead were very strongly anti-vax.

The first two or three years following my diagnosis, when I was prescribed the flu shot, my doctor said 'Sign here and roll up your sleeve." and gave it to me right then and there. Then one year my check-up was a few weeks before the vaccine was available, so he wrote me a prescription. By then, I was already seeing a lot of gains from the "crazy" alternative med stuff I was doing. It was easy enough to just not get that prescription filled. I haven't had another vaccine since then.

Fourteen years ago, I nearly died and spent 3.5 years in bed. Now, I walk four or more hours a day and I am gradually getting my life back.

I am not on some campaign to convince people that vaccines are bad. I don't have strong feelings one way or the other. For complex reasons, I happen to be in a position where I can reasonably comfortably fence-sit on this issue and not develop a strong opinion. But, as things stand now, I don't plan to get any more flu shots. I think I am better off using other tactics to protect my health.

danudey2• 11 years ago

I'm curious what is the basis for being anti-vax? Is there science behind that notion?

There was one study which claimed that vaccines were dangerous, which was both unscientific and unethical, performed by someone with an agenda, and which was retracted.

Now it's all about doubt. People are saying 'we just don't know what they do' (we do!), or 'what if they cause autism' (they don't!) or 'it's a personal choice' (it's not!).

It doesn't help that in the US, the medical industry is for-profit, the pharmaceutical industry runs rampant, and the public doesn't trust either one because it doesn't have their best interests in mind. That leads to lots of FUD about vaccines (and modern medicine in general) which is difficult to combat.

pvaldes• 11 years ago

The video can have another hidden meaning (apart that the constatation that humans are inherently stupid). This ill tiger is acting like a poisoned predator. The fact is that top predators are being systematically erradicated in a lot of places and to blame a virus as main cause is as convenient as naive.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYN0z52x4pw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PLaLUyH4-vo

9 of each 10 wild lions living in Africa 60 years ago were exterminated in just one human generation. Our generation. We will not save them only with vaccines.

Vaccinating the World's Top Predators May Be the Only Way to Save Them

Related Stories