Rinderpest: A Disease of the Past, and a Present Threat.

Rinderpest is a highly contagious viral disease that affects ungulates such as cattle, buffalo, yak, and various wildlife species, leading to significant morbidity and mortality. The global eradication of rinderpest was successfully accomplished in 2011 through extensive vaccination efforts. Today, safeguarding against the re-emergence of rinderpest in animal populations is paramount. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations and the World Organization for Animal Health are entrusted through a series of resolutions with the responsibility to prevent the re-emergence of rinderpest in animals.

The 1711 rinderpest in Bernardino Ramazzini's XIII Oration and the COVID-19 public health emergency: facts and common aspects.

Although Bernardino Ramazzini is usually regarded only as the father of occupational medicine, his approach to fight the devastating rinderpest epidemic in 1711 is worth mentioning in the light of the public health emergency represented by Coronavirus Disease-2019 (COVID-19). This commentary (i) focuses on Ramazzini's xiii oration describing that event, (ii) analyses the approach suggested to fight the cattle epidemic and economic threats, (iii) highlights some similar aspects between the 1711 rinderpest epidemic and the current COVID-19 pandemic (team expertise, contagion transmissibility, drug treatment, preventive measures, decision timeliness).

Exploring the influence of ancient and historic megaherbivore extirpations on the global methane budget.

Globally, large-bodied wild mammals are in peril. Because "megamammals" have a disproportionate influence on vegetation, trophic interactions, and ecosystem function, declining populations are of considerable conservation concern. However, this is not new; trophic downgrading occurred in the past, including the African rinderpest epizootic of the 1890s, the massive Great Plains bison kill-off in the 1860s, and the terminal Pleistocene extinction of megafauna. Examining the consequences of these earlier events yields insights into contemporary ecosystem function. Here, we focus on changes in methane emissions, produced as a byproduct of enteric fermentation by herbivores. Although methane is ∼ 200 times less abundant than carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, the greater efficiency of methane in trapping radiation leads to a significant role in radiative forcing of climate. Using global datasets of late Quaternary mammals, domestic livestock, and human population from the United Nations as well as literature sources, we develop a series of allometric regressions relating mammal body mass to population density and CH4 production, which allows estimation of methane production by wild and domestic herbivores for each historic or ancient time period. We find the extirpation of megaherbivores reduced global enteric emissions between 2.2-69.6 Tg CH4 y(-1) during the various time periods, representing a decrease of 0.8-34.8% of the overall inputs to tropospheric input. Our analyses suggest that large-bodied mammals have a greater influence on methane emissions than previously appreciated and, further, that changes in the source pool from herbivores can influence global biogeochemical cycles and, potentially, climate.

The Entangled History of Sadoka (Rinderpest) and Veterinary Science in Tanzania and the Wider World, 1891-1901.

Scholarship on the Tanzanian Rinderpest epizootic of the 1890s has assumed that German colonizers understood from the start that they were confronting the same disease that had afflicted Eurasia for centuries. Outward indicators of the epizootic, known locally as sadoka, especially wildlife destruction, were unknown in Europe, leading German veterinarians to doubt that the African disease was Rinderpest. Financial constraints and conflicting development agendas, especially tension between ranching and pastoralism, deterred early colonial applications of veterinary science that might have led to an early diagnosis. European veterinarians, guarding their authority against medical researchers, opposed inoculation therapies in the case of Rinderpest in favor of veterinary policing despite recent breakthroughs in vaccine research. The virus was not identified before reaching South Africa in 1896, but this breakthrough had little influence on policy in East Africa. Yet emergent international disease conventions directed at bubonic plague entangled with veterinary policy in East Africa.

[Effects of the periodical spread of rinderpest on famine, epidemic, and tiger disasters in the late 17th Century].

This study clarifies the causes of the repetitive occurrences of such phenomena as rinderpest, epidemic, famine, and tiger disasters recorded in the Joseon Dynasty Chronicle and the Seungjeongwon Journals in the period of great catastrophe, the late 17th century in which the great Gyeongsin famine (1670~1671) and the great Eulbyeong famine (1695~1696) occurred, from the perspective that they were biological exchanges caused by the new arrival of rinderpest in the early 17th century. It is an objection to the achievements by existing studies which suggest that the great catastrophes occurring in the late 17th century are evidence of phenomena in a little ice age. First of all, rinderpest has had influence on East Asia as it had been spread from certain areas in Machuria in May 1636 through Joseon, where it raged throughout the nation, and then to the west part of Japan. The new arrival of rinderpest was indigenized in Joseon, where it was localized and spread periodically while it was adjusted to changes in the population of cattle with immunity in accordance with their life spans and reproduction rates. As the new rinderpest, which showed high pathogenicity in the early 17th century, was indigenized with its high mortality and continued until the late 17th century, it broke out periodically in general. Contrastively, epidemics like smallpox and measles that were indigenized as routine ones had occurred constantly from far past times. As a result, the rinderpest, which tried a new indigenization, and the human epidemics, which had been already indigenized long ago, were unexpectedly overlapped in their breakout, and hence great changes were noticed in the aspects of the human casualty due to epidemics. The outbreak of rinderpest resulted in famine due to lack of farming cattle, and the famine caused epidemics among people. The casualty of the human population due to the epidemics in turn led to negligence of farming cattle, which constituted factors that triggered rage and epidemics of rinderpest. The more the number of sources of infection and hosts with low immunity increased, the more lost human resources and farming cattle were lost, which led to a great famine. The periodic outbreak of the rinderpester along with the routine prevalence of various epidemics in the 17thcentury also had influenced on domestic and wild animals. Due to these phenomenon, full-fledged famines occurred that were incomparable with earlier ones. The number of domestic animals that were neglected by people who, faced with famines, were not able to take care of them was increased, and this might have brought about the rage of epidemics like rinderpest in domestic animals like cattle. The great Gyeongsin and Eulbyeong famines due to reoccurrence of the rinderpest in the late 17th century linked rinderpester, epidemics and great famines so that they interacted with each other. Furthermore, the recurring cycle of epidemics-famines-rinderpest-great famines constituted a great cycle with synergy, which resulted in eco-economic-historical great catastrophes accompanied by large scale casualties. Therefore, the Gyeongsin and Eulbyeong famines occurring in the late 17th century can be treated as events caused by the repetition of various periodic disastrous factors generated in 1670~1671 and in 1695~1696 respectively, and particularly as phenomena caused by biological exchanges based on rinderpester., rather than as little ice age phenomena due to relatively long term temperature lowering.

Cattle scourge no more. The eradication of rinderpest and its lessons for global health campaigns.

In 2011, the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) officially declared rinderpest eradicated. This cattle virus, which has historically had significant political, economic, and social consequences, is only the second infectious disease to disappear from the face of the planet due to concerted human actions. This paper explores the effects that rinderpest has had historically, chronicles the actions of the Global Rinderpest Eradication Campaign (GREP), and discusses the lessons that GREP can offer for combating other infectious diseases. I argue that rinderpest's unique viral characteristics made eradication particularly feasible, but that GREP's activities offer important lessons for fostering international cooperation on controlling infectious disease outbreaks.

Rinderpest: the veterinary perspective on eradication.

Rinderpest was a devastating disease of livestock responsible for continent-wide famine and poverty. Centuries of veterinary advances culminated in 2011 with the UN Food and Agriculture Organization and the World Organization for Animal Health declaring global eradication of rinderpest; only the second disease to be eradicated and the greatest veterinary achievement of our time. Conventional control measures, principally mass vaccination combined with zoosanitary procedures, led to substantial declines in the incidence of rinderpest. However, during the past decades, innovative strategies were deployed for the last mile to overcome diagnostic and surveillance challenges, unanticipated variations in virus pathogenicity, circulation of disease in wildlife populations and to service remote and nomadic communities in often-unstable states. This review provides an overview of these challenges, describes how they were overcome and identifies key factors for this success.

[A short history of the control and eradication of rinderpest]. / Eine kurze Geschichte der Bekämpfung und Eradikation der Rinderpest.

This article gives a short review about the history of the control and finally eradication of Rinderpest, as only the second infectious disease in history. Emphasis is put on the 20th century. Beside the application of classical hygienic control measures, the development of appropriate diagnostic tools and of improved vaccines in conjunction with national and internationally coordinated actions, were pivotal for the eradication success. It is discussed which lessons are to be learned from this achievement--and what may be the next candidates for eradication.

Scientific background to the global eradication of rinderpest.

The global eradication of rinderpest was declared in 2011. This is the second infectious disease to have been eradicated from the world after smallpox, for which eradication was declared in 1980. From a scientific aspect, smallpox eradication was achieved by improvements in the Jenner vaccine, originally developed in the 18th century. Developments in vaccine technology and virological techniques during the 20th century have contributed to the eradication of rinderpest. The scientific background to rinderpest eradication is briefly reviewed vis-à-vis that of smallpox eradication.

An outbreak in France in the XVIIIth century: rinderpest.

Long regarded as the major disease of cattle, rinderpest is now eradicated. It was inflicting from 60 to 90% mortality on livestock. Installed in Asia, it arrived in France in waves, but never became endemic there. Four outbreaks of rinderpest hit the country during the eighteenth century. Their geographical extension has been reconstituted. They forced the State to devise the consistent set of health actions the nineteenth century benefited before the advent of microbiology.

[Feasibility study on global peste des petits ruminants eradication based on rinderpest eradication].

Eradication can be defined as permanent elimination of the occurrence of a given infectious disease. A joint FAO/OIE announcement of global rinderpest eradication was declared in 2011. The announcement from two international organizations indicates that the rinderpest virus, like the smallpox virus, will remain only in authorized laboratories. After rinderpest eradication, the relevant researchers shifted their focus on next target-peste des petits ruminants, since they mostly share similarities in such characteristics as etiology and pathology. This paper, on the one hand, analyzed objective and subjective factors in global rinderpest eradication, and on the other hand, reviewed the pros and cons of global peste des petits ruminants eradication.

The history of veterinary medicine in Namibia.

Until the middle of the 19th century, very few references exist regarding the occurrence of animal diseases in Namibia. With the introduction of contagious bovine pleuropneumonia (CBPP) in 1859, this picture changed completely and livestock owners implemented various forms of disease control in an effort to contain the spread of this disease and minimise its devastating effects. After the establishment of the colonial administration in 1884, the first animal disease legislation was introduced in 1887 and the first veterinarian, Dr Wilhelm Rickmann, arrived in 1894. CBPP and the outbreak of rinderpest in 1897 necessitated a greatly expanded veterinary infrastructure and the first veterinary laboratory was erected at Gammams near Windhoek in 1897. To prevent the spread of rinderpest, a veterinary cordon line was established, which was the very beginning of the Veterinary Cordon Fence as it is known today. After the First World War, a small but dedicated corps of veterinarians again built up an efficient animal health service in the following decades, with veterinary private practice developing from the mid-1950s. The veterinary profession organised itself in 1947 in the form of a veterinary association and, in 1984, legislation was passed to regulate the veterinary profession by the establishment of the Veterinary Council of Namibia. The outbreak of foot and mouth disease in 1961 was instrumental in the creation of an effective veterinary service, meeting international veterinary standards of quality and performance which are still maintained today.

The long journey: a brief review of the eradication of rinderpest.

In 2011, the 79th General Session of the World Assembly of the World Organisation for Animal Health (OIE) and the 37th Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAD) Conference adopted a resolution declaring the world free from rinderpest and recommending follow-up measures to preserve the benefits of this new and hard-won situation. Eradication is an achievable objective for any livestock disease, provided that the epidemiology is uncomplicated and the necessary tools, resources and policies are available. Eradication at a national level inevitably reflects national priorities, whereas global eradication requires a level of international initiative and leadership to integrate these tools into a global framework, aimed first at suppressing transmission across all infected areas and concluding with a demonstration thatthis has been achieved. With a simple transmission chain and the environmental fragility of the virus, rinderpest has always been open to control and even eradication within a zoosanitary approach. However, in the post-1945 drive for more productive agriculture, national and global vaccination programmes became increasingly relevant and important. As rinderpest frequently spread from one region to another through trade-related livestock movements, the key to global eradication was to ensure that such vaccination programmes were carried out in a synchronised manner across all regions where the disease was endemic - an objective to which the European Union, the United States Agency for International Development, the International Atomic Energy Agency, the African Union-Interafrican Bureau of Animal Resources, FA0 and OIE fully subscribed. This article provides a review of rinderpest eradication, from the seminal work carried out by Giovanni Lancisi in the early 18th Century to the global declaration in 2011.

Rinderpest: the end of cattle plague.

This paper describes the demise of rinderpest, focussing on the 20th Century and especially the period of the Global Rinderpest Eradication Programme, before proceeding to describe the process of accreditation of rinderpest freedom which is now virtually complete.