FLICKR, BRIAN MCKAYThe canine distemper virus may be infecting the Sumatran tiger, a critically endangered species living in Indonesia, according to BBC News. The virus, which devastated lions in the Serengeti in the 1990s, has become a major threat to wildlife.
“If you wind the clock back about 30 or 40 years, it was a dog disease—it was a canine virus and only affected dogs," John Lewis, director of Wildlife Vets International, told the BBC. "But in the intervening years, the virus has evolved and has changed its pattern of animals it can infect to include marine mammals (such as seals) and big cats."
Researchers believe that dogs must serve as a reservoir for the virus, and that big cats come into contact with the virus through contact with domestic dogs that have not been inoculated against it.
The virus has previously killed Siberian tigers in Russia. Now Lewis suspects it is infecting tigers on the Indonesian island of Sumatra. Symptoms of infection include respiratory problems ...
