A deadly fungal disease that is considered the worst in its impact on wildlife is spreading, putting amphibians across an entire continent at risk.
The deadly disease, known as myxomatosis, is caused by a microscopic fungus called Batrachochytrium dendrobatidis (Bd). And infection with it has a destructive effect on frogs and other amphibians.
The disease causes the skin of these animals to rupture and leads to other symptoms such as lethargy, weight loss and eventually heart failure. The disease is highly contagious and is transmitted by spores released by the fungus.
Vance Frendenburg, a professor in the Department of Biology at the University of San Francisco, told the journal "the stakes are high." "This disease is the worst in recorded history and has affected more than a thousand amphibian species, caused a decline of about 500 species, and dozens became extinct," he said.
A study now, published in the journal Frontiers in Conservation Science, has found that the fungal pathogen is spreading across the African continent, where scientists thought it survived the worst of the disease.
But Freidenburg and his colleagues found that the disease had already established itself in Africa, and that its spread over the past two decades seemed to have been ignored in the region.
The researchers found that it is likely to become more widespread, and that amphibious declines and extinctions may actually occur there out of sight.
After 2000, researchers documented a sharp increase in the prevalence of the disease, which rose by more than 21 percent during the first decade of the 21st century. In some countries, for which more data are available, the rise was higher, rising to more than 70% in Burundi, for example.