Welcome along to the first episode of WildCats Pawcast, a brand-new podcast from WildCats Conservation Alliance. To kick the series off, this month we're jumping straight in with the topic of diseases.

While global attention is currently focused on COVID-19, a disease that has jumped from animals to humans, it is important to remember that diseases that breach the species barrier also pass from people and their domestic animals to wildlife populations. And this poses a serious threat to endangered species like tigers who are already teetering on the brink of extinction.

In this episode I am going to be joined by the Deputy Country Director for the Wildlife Conservation Society's Indonesia Program Dr Matthew Linkie, Freeland Foundation's Surviving Together Program Director Tim Redford and wildlife veterinarian and epidemiologist Dr. Martin Gilbert from Cornell University. We discussed the top three infectious diseases which are having an impact on tigers, including indirect threats from African Swine Fever and Lumpy Skin Disease to the more direct impacts of Canine Distemper Virus.