Disease outbreaks that result from wildlife trade can subsequently have severe impacts on native wildlife populations, ecosystems, livestock, and human health, and they are estimated to have caused hundreds of billions of dollars in economic loss (Daszak et al. 2000; Karesh et al. 2005; Fe`vre et al. 2006; Jones et al. 2008).
The fungus, called Batrachochytrium salamandrivorans (Bsal in short), killed 99.9% of the Dutch population of fire salamanders in a short period of time. Bsal-infected salamanders were ever since discovered in three other European countries: Belgium, Germany and the UK. If no measures are taken, our salamanders and newts may be extinct within 25 to 50 years.
Regarding the potential of Bsal to affect the health of wild and kept salamanders in the Union (ToR 1), it is concluded that, based on the currently available evidence, it is likely that Bsal is a sufficient cause for the death of at least one susceptible species, S. salamandra, both in the laboratory and in the wild. Despite small sample sizes, the experimental evidence to date further indicates that Bsal is associated with disease and death in 12 European and in 3 Asian salamander species, and is associated with high mortality rate outbreaks in kept salamanders. Experimental infection by Bsal was successful in individuals of at least one species pertaining to the families Salamandridae, Plethodontidae, Hynobiidae and Sirenidae. (EFSA et al., 2017)
