Gorilla Doctors want to be prepared for Ebola threat

A group that provides veterinary care for rare wild mountain gorillas wants to be prepared in case of an Ebola outbreak. Even though a major human outbreak is currently thousands of kilometres away, the group has already thought about vaccinating the gorillas if the threat comes too close for comfort.

Mike Cranfield, the Canadianco-director of the non-profit group Gorilla Doctors, says its member are "very, very concerned" about the risk to gorillas of Ebola.

I'm not sure how available it's going to be now, whether they're holding it back for people.- Mike Cranfield, Gorilla Doctors

The human outbreak centred in West Africa has killed nearly 4,500 people, the World Health Organization reported Wednesday.

But previous outbreaks have killed tens of thousands of gorillas and chimpanzees a 2002 outbreak at Lossie Sanctuary in northwest Congo alone killed 5,000 gorillas, or 93 per cent of the population at the sanctuary, at the time, a 2006 study reported.

"It's so devastating," said Cranfield. "Where people had gone in before and there was high numbers of great apes ... now they go inand it's completely silent. They can't find any."

Cranfield, who is originally from Peterborough, Ont., was speaking to CBCNews.ca ahead of the debut of Gorilla Doctors, a documentary about his group's workthat airs tonight (Thursday) on CBC-TV's The Nature of Things.

• Watch Gorilla Doctors online on CBC-TV's The Nature of Things
• Mountain gorillas: Is Ebola a risk?

There are only about 880 mountain gorillas left in the world, including 450 to 500 that are habituated to humans, and receive monitoring and medical care from Gorilla Doctors. The group also cares for orphaned baby gorillas.

Cranfieldsaid if an Ebola outbreak threatens the gorillas under the groups' care, it will recommend to the governments of Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congo, where gorillas live, that the animals be given an experimental vaccine such as VSV-EBOV made by NewLinkGenetics. The government's permission would be required to do that.

However, Cranfield later clarified that since the major outbreak of Ebola is so far away, "there is no reason to contemplate vaccination of mountain gorillas at this time, nor have we made a request to any government to do so." An unrelated Ebola outbreak in the Democratic Republic is much smaller. As of Oct. 21, 67 cases and 49 deaths were reported by the Centres for Disease Control and Prevention.

A number of experimental Ebola vaccines have been shown to be successful in monkeys, including VSV-EBOV which is undergoing its first human trials in the U.S. Another, calledcAd3and licensed to the pharmaceutical giant GSKis also in human trials, while an experimental Ebola vaccinedeveloped by Johnson & Johnson's Crucellunit will start human trials in 2015.

Cranfield acknowledgedthat the current human outbreakmight make it hard to get a supply ofvaccine for the gorillas.

"I'm not sure how available it's going to be now, whether they're holding it back for people."

• Ebola outbreak: Why it may be time to 'take the brakes off' producing a vaccine

Other human illnesses also pose a threat to gorillas, who are susceptible to many of our diseases because they share 98.5 per cent of our genes.

Respiratory disease a leading cause of death

While the leading cause of death for gorillas is trauma, usually inflicted by adult males on infants fathered by other males, the second leading cause is respiratory disease, Cranfield said.

He added that gorillas can get diseases from both other wildlife and from humans. But the "extreme ecotourism" around parks with mountain gorillas that span the border between Rwanda and the Democratic Republic of Congoresults in a lot of human-gorilla interaction that can transmit diseases.

Gorilla Doctors treats such illnesses with antibiotics when a gorilla becomes so ill that he or she stops eating. The vetsmay also consider vaccinating gorillas against some respiratory diseases in the future if scientific evidence supports that, Cranfield said.

In the meantime, the group tries to ensure tourists who get within 20 metres of the gorillas wear masks, and the vets themselves wear protective clothing when handling thegorillas.

Cranfield says that if an Ebola outbreak does reach areas where the gorillas live, he recommends temporarily stopping human ecotours to see the gorillas.

The Gorilla Doctors' work has faced some controversy, as critics question the implications for "wild animals" that receive this amount of medical intervention and human contact.