Our Big Give Green Match Fund campaign is LIVE!

Every donation will be DOUBLED between 22nd and 29th April.

Together we have the chance to raise £16,000 to train more urgently needed Disease Detectives - to stop disease before it can decimate more threatened species. Please help us unlock these vital funds.

“The health of ecosystems on which we and all other species depend is deteriorating more rapidly than ever. We are eroding the very foundations of our economies, livelihoods, food security, health and quality of life worldwide.”[1]

The biodiversity crisis is real. Not only are we losing species at an alarming rate, with one million now threatened with extinction[2], but we are seeing significant increases in the frequency of emerging diseases, including zoonotic pathogens.

So how can you make a difference?

While many of us are passionate about protecting wild animals, traditional approaches to conservation often still focus on tackling poaching, habitat loss and climate change. While these are all important, such approaches can leave out a key piece of the puzzle: the role of disease and the urgent need to protect the health of wild animals because the spread of disease is also intricately linked to extinction, biodiversity loss and climate change.

WVI is in a unique position to get wild animals the veterinary help they need to survive, particularly in places where specialised training is difficult to access. We work in partnership with local conservation organisations and wildlife vets who are world class experts in their field to make sure local vets and biologists working on the frontline of conservation can get the training they need to be the most effective Disease Detectives they can be.

Read more about some of our most recent and ongoing initiatives:

Training conservationists in the Seychelles how to take samples from the islands’ unique bird species to check for signs of disease; Monitoring for diseases like avian influenza, which has already killed millions of birds worldwide and is now spreading to many mammals, is vital as part of wider efforts to protect wildlife health.

Making it possible for an inspiring Nigerian vet to join the world renowned Interventions in Wild Animal Health course in Kenya, so he could get formal training that will help him protect African wildlife and pass on vital knowledge to his students;

Training forest rangers in Belize how to trap, immobilise and sample puma and jaguar so their health can be monitored;

Research into the underlying health of leopards who get involved in human-wildlife conflict situations in Nepal.

As a small charity with an admin team of two, we are very reliant on funds raised through our Big Give campaigns to make sure we can keep #TrainingVets #ProtectingHealth and #SavingBiodiversity.

‍

[1] Sir Robert Watson, Chair of the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (which works in conjunction with UNEP) https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/blog/2019/05/nature-decline-unprecedented-report/

[2] https://www.un.org/sustainabledevelopment/blog/2019/05/nature-decline-unprecedented-report/

‍