<i>Bcbva</i> positive necropsies in Taï National Park from 2006 to 2015.

<p>Taï National Park is located in the south-west of Côte d’Ivoire near the Liberian border (0°15’– 6°07’N, 7°25’– 7°54’W). The box in the overview map indicates the area enlarged in the big map. Carcass monitoring has revealed continuous occurrence of <i>Bcbva</i> in the research area (marked in gray in the big map) of the Taï Chimpanzee Project. All tested serological samples were collected in this area between 2006 and 2015. The 62 out of 139 (45%) carcasses that tested positive for <i>Bcbva</i> in this period are indicated in the map. Blue dots show duiker carcasses, red dots monkey carcasses and black dots chimpanzee carcasses. The figure has been created by the authors of the manuscript with the freely available software QGIS. Shape files for Africa were freely available at <a href="http://maplibrary.org/library/index.htm" target="_blank">http://maplibrary.org/library/index.htm</a>.</p

Low antibody prevalence against <i>Bacillus cereus</i> biovar <i>anthracis</i> in Taï National Park, Côte d'Ivoire, indicates high rate of lethal infections in wildlife

<div><p><i>Bacillus cereus</i> biovar <i>anthracis (Bcbva)</i> is a member of the <i>B</i>. <i>cereus</i> group which carries both <i>B</i>. <i>anthracis</i> virulence plasmids, causes anthrax-like disease in various wildlife species and was described in several sub-Saharan African rainforests. Long-term monitoring of carcasses in Taï National Park, Côte d’Ivoire, revealed continuous wildlife mortality due to <i>Bcbva</i> in a broad range of mammalian species. While non-lethal anthrax infections in wildlife have been described for <i>B</i>. <i>anthracis</i>, nothing is known about the odds of survival following an anthrax infection caused by <i>Bcbva</i>. To address this gap, we present the results of a serological study of anthrax in five wildlife species known to succumb to <i>Bcbva</i> in this ecosystem. Specific antibodies were only detected in two out of 15 wild red colobus monkeys (<i>Procolobus badius</i>) and one out of 10 black-and-white colobus monkeys (<i>Colobus polykomos</i>), but in none of 16 sooty mangabeys (<i>Cercocebus atys</i>), 9 chimpanzees (<i>Pan troglodytes verus</i>) and 9 Maxwell’s duikers (<i>Cephalophus maxwellii</i>). The combination of high mortality and low antibody detection rates indicates high virulence of this disease across these different mammalian species.</p></div

Results overview.

<p>Results overview.</p