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Sonny Bacigalupo - Towards a unified generic framework to define and observe contacts between livestock and wildlife: a systematic review
Wild animals are the source of many pathogens of livestock and humans. Concerns about the potential transmission of economically important and zoonotic diseases from wildlife have led to increased surveillance at the livestock-wildlife interface.
Knowledge of the types, frequency and duration of contacts between livestock and wildlife is necessary to identify risk factors for disease transmission and to design possible mitigation strategies. Observing the behaviour of many wildlife species is challenging due to their cryptic nature and avoidance of humans, meaning there are relatively few studies in this area.
Further, a consensus on the definition of what constitutes a ‘contact’ between wildlife and livestock is lacking. A systematic review was conducted to investigate which livestock-wildlife contacts have been studied and why, as well as the methods used to observe each species. Over 30,000 publications were screened, of which 122 fulfilled specific criteria for inclusion in the analysis.