WildLife Group
of the SAVA
veterinary management
of African Wildlife Conference 2017
Dr Greg simpson
The Faculty of Veterinary Science (FVS) recently
co-hosted the Veterinary Management of African
Wildlife Conference with the South African Veterinary
Association Wildlife Group (SAVA WG) from the
21st to 25th February. This was the first time the
annual SAVA WG joined with the faculty to host their
annual conference. We had a great turnout with 219
registrations, including 8 international delegates, 43
students and 18 trade representatives.
It was a busy five days starting with two workshops:
“Critical monitoring during immobilization” by Dr Leith
Meyer and “Carnivore immobilization, anaesthesia
and nutrition” by Dr Adrian Tordiffe, both from the
FVS. The following four days had themes. The first
being “Rhino and Elephant Conservation Medicine”
with the keynote speaker Dr Michael Knight of
the IUCN African Rhino Specialist Group talking
on “Medicine to save Africa’s rhinos”. The second
day’s theme was “People and Wildlife” with Dr
Mike Kock talking on “Protected areas and people:
where have all the elephant and rhino gone, and
more important why?”. He gave great veterinary and
8
medical anthropological perspective on transfrontier
conservation areas.
Friday’s theme was “Wildlife Disease” with Dr
William Karesh opening with the talk “Can we call
them wildlife diseases anymore?” which gave a
global perspective on emerging diseases. The theme
of the last day was “Applied Clinical Practice” with
Dr Johan Marais started the day with the insightful
“Rhino in the room”. We were fortunate to have
a great variety of speakers from Southern Africa,
North America, Europe and Asia. They covered a
diversity of topics from
tuberculosis diagnosis
to immobilization drug
protocols and side
effects. The talks are