Five major diseases have been identified in Blood Lions’ recently released study with World Animal Protection that can inflict serious health issues for people.
- Human Ehrlichiosis
- Human Babesiosis
- African Sleeping Sickness
The first two are tick-borne diseases, where the bacteria and parasite respectively are transmitted from animals to people by ticks.
Toxocariasis and Trichinosis parasites are transmitted more directly to humans, the former (for example) by handling faeces contaminated soil and the latter has a direct animal-humantransmission.
Lastly, African Sleeping Sickness (or Trypanosomiasis) is caused by a parasite transmitted by the tsetse fly and is listed as a Neglected Tropical Disease by the World Health Organisation (WHO).
Over the last century, this disease has caused several epidemics in Africa.
To curb these vicious zoonotic cycles, we are calling on the public to STOP interacting with lions and for Department of Environment, Forestry & Fisheries to set a ZERO lion bone quota in an effort to begin phasing out the captive lion breeding industry in South Africa.