Parasites include many kinds of bacteria, viruses, and worms, among others. These are organisms that live on or in another organism (the host), from which they get their resources, at some cost to the host. Parasites are all around us, and people are known to get at least 1400 parasites from other animals! Many parasites can cause disease and are harmful. They aren’t all bad, though, because they play important roles in ecosystems, similar to predators. Primates include lemurs, tarsiers, monkeys, apes, and people. Because we’re so closely related to wild primates, we can get a lot of the same parasites. One of the most famous includes the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), which came from SIV (simian immunodeficiency virus). There are lots of parasites that infect many mammals – they are generalists that can infect different host species. Other parasites are specialized, and are only found in a single host species. These complex patterns make it hard to predict which parasites can be shared among species or in different environments. Primates are common in captivity for many reasons. They are a favorite in zoos and sanctuaries, and they are used in biomedical research – for better or worse. While in these captive settings, primates get medical treatment, including quarantines before being introduced to new groups, frequent testing for parasites, deworming and antibiotics, as well as high standards for hygiene. Given these conditions, we predicted that captive primates have fewer parasites than their wild counterparts. In a study published recently in the American Journal of Primatology, we tested this prediction to find out if parasites are lost in captivity. We compared the presence of almost 600 parasites known from 23 primate species for which data are available in the wild and in captivity in the published literature. With these paired comparisons, we tested if captive primates have fewer parasites than the same species in the wild. Counter to our predictions, there was no overall difference in parasite species richness between wild and captive primates. This was surprising because we expected that the sterilized captive environment and access to veterinary care would eliminate many wild parasites in captivity. We also compared which parasite species are found in primates in the two settings, and how the parasites found in each setting differed. We found that the parasite communities were significantly different between the wild and captive conditions. Primates in the wild have diverse parasite communities that include those with vectors and intermediate hosts (e.g., mosquito- or tick-borne, or parasites that have different life stages in different host species). In contrast, primates in captivity have mostly parasites that are transmitted through the environment, especially those spread through feces, and via close-contact. Further, captive primate species have many parasites that are known to infect people, livestock, and other domesticated animals. Similar results have been shown for the microorganisms in the guts of primates; captivity makes the community of gut bacteria of captive primates more similar to that of people than to the wild gut bacteria, with important implications for health.
Don’t be afraid of getting sick from primates at the zoo. In our study, we did not actually test individual zoo animals and find parasites; we found published studies from a range of facilities. I suggest you do not touch captive animals or their enclosures, and you will have very little risk of getting a parasite from zoo animals. Actually, you can be more dangerous to the primates than they are to you in terms of diseases. Primates can get sick from our diseases if you try to feed or touch them. Also, people who maintain captive primates should be aware of the parasites to which they are exposed, and protect themselves when in close proximity to primates, and their environments. The same is true in the opposite direction: captive and wild primates are at risk of getting parasites from people that can be deadly – this is a risk for the captive colony, as well as wild populations. This is another great reason why primates are not pets. Primates can get sick from our germs, and we can get sick from theirs.
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AuthorJames P. Herrera Archives
January 2023
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