Disease and Antarctic wildlife

Monitoring to ensure early detection

Monitoring should be designed to detect unusual mortalities in Antarctic wildlife, to identify the causal agent or agents, and to determine whether the causal agent is indigenous or exotic. Routine monitoring should be based upon standardised protocols for selection of species and sites, for collection, storage and transport of samples, for post-mortem techniques and reporting procedures. Serum and specimen banks will be required to house samples and these need to be established. Priorities for monitoring should be those sites that are most frequently visited. Appropriate control sites, away from human activity, will be essential for reliable interpretation of monitoring results. Monitoring should be reported regularly and coordinated by a central clearing-house responsible for receiving all results and for making the collated information available to assist in an emergency response.