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UNITED KINGDOM, January 28, 2004: Scientists believe they have identified the main cause behind the catastrophic decline in the numbers of Asian vultures. In the past 10 years, population losses of more than 95% have been reported in three raptor species — Oriental white-backed vulture (Gyps bengalensis), the long-billed vulture (Gyps indicus) and the slender-billed vulture (Gyps tenuirostris) — across many areas of the Indian sub-continent. Research done by Lindsay Oaks’ team has now shown the birds are dying after eating the carcasses of livestock treated with the common veterinary drug diclofenac. Dr. Oaks, backed by The Peregrine Fund, reports her work in Nature magazine. “This discovery is significant in that it is the first known case of a pharmaceutical causing major ecological damage over a huge geographic area and threatening three species with extinction,” the US researcher from Washington State University said. The birds succumb to kidney failure and visceral gout. Early signs that the raptors are affected can be seen from the way they hang their heads down to their feet for long periods. Now, Dr. Oaks and colleagues have found high residues diclofenac in dead vultures in the field. “Vultures have an important ecological role in the Asian environment, where they have been relied upon for millennia to clean up and remove dead livestock and even human corpses,” said Dr. Munir Virani, a biologist for US-based Peregrine Fund, and who coordinated the massive field investigations across Nepal, India, and Pakistan. “Their loss has important economic, cultural, and human health consequences.”

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