Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka has been studying gorillas for over 20 years
It flies a chance/UNEP
When Gladys Karema Jixoka became Uganda’s first wildlife veterinarian in 1995, there were only 650 wild mountain gorillas in the world, 300 of which lived in the Bwindi Impenetrable National Park in southwestern Uganda. was Entire species were endangered and the future looked bleak.
So Karema Ziksorka had an idea. The 25-year-old, a recent graduate from the Royal Veterinary College in London, said her three major threats to gorillas – disease, habitat loss and poaching – could improve the health and well-being of local people. I realized that I could deal with it. This approach was highly unusual at the time, but is now seen as a model for conservation action worldwide.
In 2003, she left the Uganda Wildlife Authority to become the founder and CEO of the non-profit Conservation Through Public Health. She has been conserving mountain gorillas in Bwindi for the past 20 years, and the population is on the rise. her memoir, walking with a gorilla, will be published on April 13.she spoke new scientist about her life and work.
Gorillas are vulnerable to many diseases that affect their human neighbors
Joan MacArthur
Graham Lawton: How did you get a job as Uganda’s first wildlife veterinarian, fresh out of veterinary school?
Gladys Kalema-Zikusoka: Every time I came home from college vacation, I was working with wildlife. I worked in the Budongo Forest and did my first wildlife studies, looking for parasites in chimpanzee faecal samples. Two years later, I…
