Description

The risk of potential spillover of pathogens from wild animals to humans has received increased attention since the outbreak of the covid pandemic. This has created justified concern about the hunting, handling, transporting, and selling of wild animals as part of the ‘wild meat’ trade. There are several potential health risks associated with the use of wild meat. First, there are direct risks to the users of wild meat from poor hygiene in the handling and preparation of meat resulting in infections such as Salmonellosis, Campylobacter, and Giardia. Second, there are risks from viruses that are transmitted from bodily fluids of animals that can then be transmitted to other humans such as Ebola and Marburg virus. Finally, there are global risks from the emergence of highly transmissible viruses that can cause epidemics and pandemics such as, HIV, H7N9 Influenza, SARS-CoV-1 and the recent Covid-19 pandemic (SARS-CoV-2).

Wild meat is widely consumed in Cameroon in both rural and urban areas and all three categories of health risks associated with wild meat are present. And yet, wild meat makes a very important contribution to diets in Cameroon.
In this project we aim to understand the behaviors that expose people to different types of risks along the chain of actors involved in the wild meat food chain from the forest to the plate in Cameroon. The overall goal is to develop recommendations for activities and policies that mitigate risks of disease transmission along the chain.