Over the past two decades, an amphibian-killing fungus has been rapidly spreading throughout Africa. The fungus endangers the amphibians in the continent by causing heart failure.
The unnoticed growth of the deadly fungus, Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (commonly known as Bd), that feed on the skin of frogs and other amphibians have been observed in Africa in the past two decades.
The rapid spread of the fungus across the continent has prompted fears that it may destroy the amphibian population in Africa as it has done everywhere in the world.
The Bd fungus causes amphibians to die by making their skin grow up to 40 times thicker than it should. The growth in the skin makes it difficult for the animals to breathe and causes them to get dehydrated. Many of them develop diseases that eventually lead to heart failure.
According to research, Chytridiomycosis is the condition brought on by the fungus that causes heart failure in amphibians. This condition has been linked to significant population declines in nations like America and Australia.
Bd is a member of the fundamental fungal family known as chytridiomycids. It produces asexual swarm spores that swim using a whip-like flagellum. Bd spores grow in warm, wet environments, embed in keratinized mouthparts and skins of salamanders, newts, and caecilians, mainly frogs and toads, and reproduce there.
As chytridiomycosis does not require an animal vector to spread and since the spores can infect at least 1,000 distantly related species. Bd is extremely contagious. Tadpoles are rarely affected by the disease, but it frequently kills adults, who often experience skin peeling, lethargy, weight loss, and ultimate cardiac failure.
Bd is believed to have started in Asia and spread by the late 1900s to all continents except Antarctica. The influence of Bd in Africa hasn’t been thoroughly studied yet. It may have been present on the continent as early as 1930, but a little.
Several studies suggest that infection rates have increased recently. However, this could be just a result of the increased studies on Bd in recent years.
The current study indicates that the reprieve from chytridiomycosis epidemics, which had only so far spared amphibian species in Africa, is now probably over.
The earliest Bd-specimen was from 1933, but until 2000, the prevalence in all of Africa remained below 5%. The prevalence climbed further after that year, peaking at 17.2%.
The researchers conclude that Bd started to spread throughout Africa in the year 2000 and may be responsible for unrecognized epidemics right now. According to studies, the Bd will probably continue to expand throughout Africa.
Vance T. Vredenburg, associate chair of biology at San Francisco University, and his associates used the amphibian museum collections to learn more about Bd.
The preservation of fungi and other parasites along with the host animals makes it possible for researchers to use museum specimens to investigate the evolution of the infectious disease.
From roughly 3000 specimens that had been collected in Africa over the previous century, the team extracted skin swabs. They acquired hundreds of more records from prior studies of specimens taken between 1852 and 2017 and evaluated the skin of 1651 live amphibians encountered in the wild.
Using all the data gathered, the researchers discovered that Bd stayed under the radar in Africa during the 1900s, continuously showing up in less than 5% of studied animals. The prevalence shot up to almost 20% across the continent in the early 2000s, which brought about a change in that situation at the turn of the century.
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According to Vredenburg, what led to the increase in this fungus is still unclear, but trade and the accompanying movement of people and goods could be one explanation. It has previously occurred in other parts of the world.
Vredenburg claims that the frogs might have gotten inside the banana shipments in the Caribbean and appeared to have transported the fungus from one island to another.
There is also the possibility that amphibians may become more vulnerable to diseases as a result of stress brought on by climate change or that the pathogen’s climate envelope may be expanding due to climate change.
Vredenburg stated that the first thing that needs to be done is to see if there are any epidemics affecting amphibians in the locations where they found significant Bd prevalence. A dynamic representation of the pathogen-host interaction is what they require.
According to reports, many of the areas where Bd is increasing have also had population losses in amphibians, which the researchers claim is not a coincidence.
As per the studies of Vredenburg and his associates, Equatorial Guinea is the only country in Africa where the presence of the Bd fungus has significantly declined. They are unaware of the cause of this decline.
Although it is impossible to eradicate this minute fungus from the world, many host species may tolerate it if given the chance. The moral obligation that people have is to get involved and attempt to manage and reduce this pathogen wherever feasible because it looks like people are moving the pathogen around the globe.
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