Meat from wild and domestic animals can represent important sources of macro and micro nutrients. Since bushmeat is often the main source of meat available in some parts of developing countries, the loss of bushmeat species means losing a source of protein, fats, and important micronutrients, such as iron, from diets. Hence, in such countries children who eat little bushmeat are likely to be iron-deficient and thus be anemic.

Duiker meat sold in Makokou, Gabon. Photo: Nathalie van Vliet.The nutritional importance of bushmeat includes also its role as an energy source mostly from fats. In particular, the fat content may be important as fat has considerably higher energy content per unit of mass than protein and carbohydrates. In fact, malnutrition seldom is due to insufficient protein intake, but more commonly to insufficient energy intake, which obliges the body to use protein as an energy source, reducing the amount of protein available for growth, maintenance and replacement of body tissue, as well as other physiological functions.

The nutritional characteristics of bushmeat, in part, explain high bushmeat demand, particularly from urban areas. This also contributes to the social and cultural constructions around bushmeat consumption choices. Urban consumers often consider bushmeat a wholesome, safe alternative to commercially produced meat offered at grocery stores. It is preferred to farm-raised meats based on the perception or misperception that the latter regularly contains chemicals and additives. In Equatorial Guinea, for example, when consumers were asked why they bought bushmeat, a large proportion stated that it was because it was fresh or healthy. Similarly, in Gabon, bushmeat is also perceived as a ‘healthy food, natural, fresh and without artificial additives’. In some hunter–gatherer communities, bushmeat is preferred for its alleged zootherapy use. Bushmeat is often considered healthy by urban consumers, despite the potential risk from zoonotic diseases.

The risk of contracting a disease depends on several factors but may occur even in mosaic landscapes of farms and fragmented forests where human–wildlife interaction is generally indirect or incidental. The lack of personal protection or hygiene during killing, handling and butchering is thought to be the main route of infection. While the process of curing/cooking the meat generally reduces the risk, it also requires consideration.

Researchers have increasingly worked to assess the origins and worldwide trends in emerging infectious diseases. The bushmeat trade can act as a conduit for pathogen spread and increase exposure and risk of transmission of different zoonoses. A recent study in the United States examined how the bushmeat originating from primate and rodent species (including baboons, chimpanzee, mangabeys, guenons, green monkey, cane rat, and rat) smuggled into the country served as reservoirs for retroviruses (simian foamy virus) and/or herpes viruses. Zoonoses from African apes to humans, and vice versa, are known to be common because of the physiological similarities between the groups and could lead to outbreaks of human diseases (such as Ebola or HIV (human immunodeficiency virus)).

Beyond bushmeat use, many other factors actually influence the emergence or re-emergence of wildlife related zoonoses. It has been suggested that changes in human ecology and behaviour, including migration, globalisation and increased population density, social conflict and war, changes in personal behaviour, and increased deforestation, all play an important role in the emergence of new infectious diseases. Practices associated with these trends are changing ecological dynamics and facilitating human-wildlife contact that may enable disease transmission. Climate change, agricultural practices, antibiotic resistance, and immunodeficiency (related to HIV) have also influenced global trends in the emergence and re-emergence of infectious diseases.

The majority of forest communities/forest dwellers - still have inadequate access to official health services, and the services that do exist may be culturally inappropriate. Traditional medicine is widely available and affordable, even in remote areas, and generally accessible to most people. In many developing countries, a large part of the population, especially in rural areas, depend mainly on traditional medicine for their primary health care, because it is cheaper and more accessible than western medicine. Traditional medicine is also accepted and trusted because it blends readily into socio-cultural belief systems.

Many cultures still employ traditional medicine that includes animal-derived remedies. Probably the most famous of these are some Asian cultures, who use animals for a variety of ailments. Lesser known and studied, though just as varied and rich, are Africa’s and Latin America’s long tradition of animal-derived remedies for all kinds of ailments. At least 584 animal species are used in traditional medicine in Latin America.

Animal-derived remedies are used for treating various diseases. A single illness can be treated by using various animal species (e.g., in Latin America, 215 animal species are used in the treatment of asthma and 95 in the treatment of rheumatism), and many species are prescribed for treating multiple illnesses, as in the case of the products obtained from the tegu (Salvator merianae) and the boa constrictor, which are indicated to treat 29 and 30 conditions, respectively.

Ingredients reportedly used for zootherapy are varied and can include: fat, flesh, bone, bone marrow, cartilage, skin, tails, feathers, liver, bile, milk, rattle (from rattlesnakes), spine, shell, honey, wax, scales, rostral expansion, otolith, penis, carapace, blood, gizzard, beak, insect cocoons, teeth, tongue, egg, egg shells, tibia, secretions, head, heart, urine, feet, legs, nest, guts, bezoar, ear, paw, spawn, nails, horn, sucking dish, eye, or more rarely, whole animals.