CTPH - CONSERVATION THROUGH PUBLIC HEALTH

UPCOMING

Uganda: Out of the Wild

Conservation Through Public Health (CTPH) and it's founder Dr. Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka will be featured in a story from the wilds of Uganda's "Impenetrable Forest" – home to the world's largest population of Mountain Gorillas, but also a hotbed for a number of deadly diseases that cross the species barrier from animals to humans. Here, a new idea in public health called "One Health" is emerging to help combat threats like Ebola, Marburg virus, and TB. Says wildlife veterinarian William Karesh: "What we learned over the years is that all the same diseases that we were dealing with in the wildlife were the same as what we were dealing with in people living in the surrounding areas, or in their animals. So when we say that there’s human health or livestock health or wildlife health, we just made that up. There’s only one health. PBS. Frontline World.
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Events

Dr. Gladys at the Healthy Parks Healthy People Congress 2010

Dr. Gladys is honored to be a part of the Healthy Parks Healthy People Congress 2010 held in Melbourne, Australia April 11-16. The United Nations has declared 2010 as the International Year of Biodiversity, making it a particularly appropriate year in which to stage the Congress. The Congress principle regarding the importance of a healthy environment to achieve healthy communities is a symbiotic dependency. This international focus on biodiversity in nature in 2010 will further enhance the significance of this relationship.
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Dr. Gladys at University of California Davis

Dr. Gladys speaks at University of California Davis
October 7, 6:30-8pm
University of California Davis
Giedt Hall, Room 1002
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Linking Wildlife and Human Health in Uganda

Dr. Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka DVM speaks about Conservation Through Public Health and Linking Wildlife and Human Health in Uganda. Sunday, October 18th at 7pm; James Law Auditorium; Cornell University; Ithaca, New York, USA
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Wildlife Conservation Expo Day October 3rd 2009

Enjoy presentations from an assemblage of world-class wildlife conservationists who are living and working with indigenous communities to protect endangered wildlife and wild places. Join Dr. Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka and other conservation entrepreneurs including, keynote speaker Dr. Jane Goodall at the Wildlife Conservation Network Expo.
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Sustainable Environments and Livelihoods

The problems I see as ripe for cross-disciplinary research are those where multidisciplinary approaches have potential to promote sustainable development alongside sustainable environments in developing countries, because even in the developed world, conservation and development are seen as competing forces, yet have even greater potential in the developed world.
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Q & A with Dr. Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka

Dr. Kalema-Zikusoka is the Founder and Chief Executive Officer of Conservation Through Public Health, an international grassroots NGO, to promote conservation with public health by improving primary health services for people and animals around protected areas throughout Uganda.
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Saving gorillas by bringing healthcare to local people in Uganda

How can bringing healthcare to local villagers in Uganda help save the Critically Endangered mountain gorilla? The answer lies in our genetics, says Dr. Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka, wildlife veterinarian and director of Conservation through Public Health (CTPH).
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LAIR OF THE SILVERBACKS

It's a lush green tropical forest in southwest Uganda, home to about half of the world's estimated 700 mountain gorillas. But what makes Bwindi so special is not only these critically endangered, magnificent, and charismatic cousins with whom humans have in common 98.4 percent of their genetic material, but also the special charm and hospitality of the people who share this fragile World Heritage site with the planet's gentle giants – and whose livelihood is increasingly dependent on gorilla ecotourism.
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She has dedicated her life to making human beings co-exist with animals

You donâ€™t need to have fully read Dr Gladys Kalemaâ€™s profile to comprehend her love for wildlife. The gorilla sculptures at the reception of her office, speak volumes. It is not by accident that today, she is one of the most popular conservationists of our time. Back in the day, when she joined Kibuli Secondary School, she helped revive the Wild Life Club which had gone quiet. She confesses to have been a passionate lover of cats when she was a child.
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CTPH FOUNDER AND CEO WINS THE WHITLEY GOLD AWARD

On 13th May 2009, Conservation Through Public Health Founder and CEO, Dr. Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka won the Whitley Gold Award for grassroots nature conservation also known as the "Green Oscars", presented by HRH, Princess Anne, at a ceremony at the Royal Geographical Society in London. The Whitley Awards worth £30,000 were presented to five other outstanding conservation leaders from Bulgaria, India, Kenya, Sri Lanka and Thailand.
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While working as a veterinarian for the Uganda Wildlife Authority in 1996, I led a team that managed the first scabies skin disease outbreak in mountain gorillas. An infant, Ruhara, had the most severe case in the group losing over 75% of his hair, becoming extremely thin, constantly crying, and was even too weak to hold onto his mother. After his death, a fresh post-mortem and laboratory diagnosis confirmed that Ruhara died of scabies.

We started to ask ourselves, “Where could the scabies could have come from?” Research demonstrated that one of the most common skin diseases in low-income groups of people in Uganda is scabies. Why? Because it is a disease of poor hygiene and crowded conditions. The puzzle was coming together: this particular gorilla group periodically foraged in communities gardens to raid their banana crops; add that to the fact that many of these communities living near protected parks are the most isolated and impoverished communities in Africa, with 200 to 300 people per square kilometer and limited access to the most basic healthcare, and you have the perfect breeding ground for scabies mites. We had our answer: humans were the host of the scabies mite for this gorilla family. It was clear that in these fragile areas where wildlife, people and livestock intersect, a decline in any of them affects the survival of the others: today this message is the backbone of Conservation Through Public Health (CTPH).