Trade in African wildlife at center of global zoonotic diseases like Coronavirus

The COVID-19 has ravaged the world changing the lives of millions and devastating economies across the world. With actual infections reaching over half a million people, the focus has now shifted to the role trade in wildlife contributes to such epidemics. Just like COVID-19, other previous emergencies in the world can be directly traced to wildlife trade. From HIV, to Ebola, Rift Valley fever, SARS, pandemic influenza H1N1 2009, yellow fever, avian influenza (H5N1) and (H7N9), West Nile virus and the Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) reported in the recent past. World Health Organization (WHO) estimates that globally, about one billion cases of illnesses and millions of deaths occur every year from zoonosis. Some 60% of emerging infectious diseases that are reported globally are zoonosis. Over 30 new human pathogens have been detected in the last three decades, 75% of which have originated in animals. Zoonotic diseases are as old as the human race. Since human beings started experimenting with bush meat, there have been numerous cases of diseases crossing over from the wild. The bubonic plague that devastated Europe in middle-ages killing millions is one such case, which was caused by rats. The Spanish flu of 1918 was