[Photo above: Dead elephant seal pups spread on an extended Argentine beach of coastal Patagonia. Adults abandoned the breeding area. There are only carcasses in a coast that should have congregated thousands of reproductive females and males. Photo credit: ©Maxi Jonas.]
 

Bronx, NY (October 1, 2026)— Wildlife health surveillance is no longer a luxury. It is both a global conservation and health security imperative. Most countries still lack reliable systems to detect disease in wildlife, leaving the world dangerously vulnerable to the next conservation crisis—or the next disease threat that spreads across wildlife, livestock, and people. In response, the Wildlife Health Intelligence Network (WHIN) has now published three papers that, taken together, provide a diagnosis of the challenge, a blueprint to help close this global blind spot before the next threat unfolds, and the tools to get there. 

These papers point to a clear opportunity: by joining WHIN groups can more effectively and cost efficiently build wildlife health surveillance systems together. Through WHIN, shared tools (including HAWK, a data service for managing wildlife health surveillance data), training, data standards, and practical experience can help efforts move faster, avoid costly duplication, and strengthen preparedness before the next crisis emerges.

WHIN is an open, global community of practice uniting experts, organizations, and governments to build wildlife health surveillance systems that are locally led and aligned with international standards. WHIN was created because most countries still lack the consistent, long-term systems needed to understand and respond to health threats affecting wild animals and ecosystems. These systems are essential for conserving wildlife populations and ecological integrity while providing an early warning system for threats before they spread to livestock, people, local economies, or global supply chains. 

Published in separate journals, the three new papers deliver a coordinated global blueprint for building wildlife health surveillance systems from the local to international level. Collectively, the papers answer three practical questions:

• Why does wildlife health surveillance matter?
• How can countries build effective systems? 
• What tools can they use to get started?

This work demonstrates that paying attention to health and disease in wild animal populations is not a niche technical activity, but essential infrastructure for conserving wildlife, maintaining healthy ecosystems, and supporting One Health, food security, livelihoods, and preparedness for emerging threats.

The first paper makes the case that wildlife health surveillance is not simply a conservation issue—it underpins progress on many of the world's biggest environmental, health, and development goals. It explains why they matter, drawing a direct line between wildlife health and a majority of the United Nations' Sustainable Development Goals, including Zero Hunger, Good Health and Well-Being, Clean Water and Sanitation, Climate Action, and Life on Land and Below Water. 

The paper recalls examples of outbreaks that have devastated both wildlife and livestock economies alike. Peste des petits ruminants, for instance, caused an estimated 80 percent decline in the endangered Mongolian saiga antelope and 90 percent mortality in unvaccinated sheep and goats. On the economic side, every $1 million injected into the economy by nature-based tourism to see Rwanda's mountain gorillas creates roughly 1,328 jobs. Failures to detect wildlife disease early can thus carry enormous ecological and economic costs.

The second paper shifts from diagnosis to solutions, laying out a roadmap to overcome the barriers to implementing and growing locally sustainable and appropriate surveillance for wildlife health. Tiggy Grillo, co-chair of the IUCN SSC Wildlife Health Specialist Group, said, “The goal is to connect local and national actors with the expertise and resources critical to build effective harmonized systems faster, while using international coordination to strengthen and guide local action, such as those developed via WHIN as well as IUCN (e.g. WOAH/IUCN General Guidelines for Surveillance of Diseases, Pathogens, and Toxic Agents in Free-ranging Wildlife).”

Meeting that challenge, WHIN concludes, will require progress on six mutually reinforcing fronts. These include, shifting mindsets away from viewing wildlife as an economic liability and toward collaborative models of cooperation, building the political will and aligned funding, strengthening the evidence base through research on cost-effectiveness and prioritization, developing open-source and interoperable technologies, and enhancing local capacity through training that empowers in-country experts. 

The sixth element is a global community of practice, anchored by WHIN, that connects intergovernmental bodies, national programs, Indigenous communities, and field practitioners to share expertise and avoid reinventing solutions. Rather than prescribing a top-down mandate, WHIN’s theory of change calls for collaboration from every direction to scale up solutions that already work—such as WildHealthNet in Southeast Asia and the WOAH South-East Asia Wildlife Health Network—rather than asking every country to start from scratch. As WHIN puts it, sustainable implementation “exceeds the capacity of any single institution.”

Finally, in the third paper, the authors embrace a Needs Assessment Tool, piloted in Thailand and Rwanda, that gives countries a practical instrument to evaluate an emerging or well-established WHS program. It helps countries identify the strongest parts of their wildlife health surveillance systems—and where the biggest gaps remain. 

The tool covers topics ranging from diagnostic laboratories to communication and governance, helping pinpoint where investment will make the greatest difference. Built around detection, identification, analysis, management, communication, and applied research, the tool assesses each area by urgency and impact so that resources can be effectively targeted. It provides a concrete example of tools that can be shared across a community of practice to support similar needs.

Together, these findings make the case for collective action: WHIN gives partners a way to pool resources and expertise through shared training, common data standards, and hard-won field experience, so no single country or organization has to build wildlife health surveillance capacity alone, and the world is better prepared before the next crisis hits. WHIN invites governments, international organizations, funders, and local communities to treat wildlife health surveillance as core infrastructure rather than an afterthought. Investing in wildlife health today is an investment in a safer, healthier, and more sustainable future.

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One Health Institute

The One Health Institute at UC Davis advances health and conservation worldwide by addressing complex challenges at the interface of animals, people, plants, and the environment. Based within the UC Davis School of Veterinary Medicine, the Institute brings together an interconnected network of centers, laboratories, programs, and projects, each applying specialized expertise and diverse partnerships to deliver science-based solutions while contributing to a shared global One Health mission.

United States Department of Agriculture, Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service, Wildlife Services (WS)

WS leads USA’s national efforts to reduce human-wildlife conflicts that protect human health and safety (including disease threats), agriculture and livestock, natural resources, and property. WS conducts wildlife damage management activities at the request of stakeholders in every U.S. state and three permanently inhabited territories, providing local expertise and direct assistance for agricultural producers and other private landowners; local, state, federal, and tribal government programs; industry; and non-profit organizations among others. Specific to wildlife disease, WS conducts wildlife research through its National Wildlife Research Center, and coordinates national-scale wildlife disease surveillance and control of wildlife-interface diseases through its National Wildlife Disease Program, National Rabies Program, and National Feral Swine Damage Management Program.

World Organisation for Animal Health (WOAH)

WOAH is the global authority on animal health. Established in 1924 in response to the devastating rinderpest outbreak in Belgium, WOAH has remained dedicated to monitoring, controlling and disseminating information on animal diseases worldwide. Recognizing the critical role of wildlife health in protecting animal and human health, biodiversity and ecosystems, WOAH works with its Members and partners to strengthen wildlife disease surveillance, early detection and reporting. By improving animal health and supporting greater transparency on animal diseases, WOAH contributes to building a safer, healthier and more sustainable world.

Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO)

Since it was established in 1945, FAO supports countries in strengthening animal health systems through prevention and control, surveillance and early warning, emergency preparedness and response, stronger veterinary services and laboratories, and a One Health approach. This work is highly complementary to WHIN's focus on wildlife. Because disease threats move across the animal-human-environment interface, FAO works actively to keep these two areas aligned, collaborating with WHIN to harmonize data models and standards across the livestock, aquaculture and wildlife sectors — for example, through the current testing of HAWK. FAO also plays a leading role in advancing data harmonization for animal health more broadly, including through the development of a Reference Data Service (RDS), which provides shared, standardized reference data to support interoperable surveillance systems worldwide.

ILRI

The International Livestock Research Institute (ILRI) works to improve the lives of people in low- and middle-income countries through science-based livestock solutions. As the only CGIAR center focused on livestock, ILRI works to transform food systems equitably and sustainably, with benefits for people, animals, and the environment. Co-hosted by Kenya and Ethiopia, ILRI has regional or country offices throughout Africa and Asia. ilri.or