An Iranian zoo has killed 14 lions after they were infected with a highly infectious disease called glanders, an Iranian newspaper reported on Monday. According to the newspaper, a zoo veterinarian said that the lions most likely caught the disease due to the zoo's mismanagement. The animals could have contracted the disease through contaminated food and water. Glanders is a disease caused by bacteria called Burkholderia mallei and it usually infects domesticated animals however, it can also affect wild animals. The infection could spread to humans but not from one person to another. The veterinarian added that the zoo didn't have to kill the lions, as the disease is treatable in wild animals regardless of it being untreatable for domesticated ones. A local Iranian news agency reported that the disease could also be spread through the city by stray cats. “The feral cats, which frequently go to the zoo, can transfer the disease to the rest of the city easily,” Ami Khosravi, a veterinarian from the Tehran Veterinary Center, told the new agency. Three other lions have died of glanders at the same zoo, and a Siberian tiger also died two weeks ago, according to the vet. The zoo claims the deaths were an unrelated incident that may have been another glanders death. The tigers came to the zoo as part of an animal exchange program between Russia and Iran. The other tiger is still in the zoo reportedly under quarantine. BM
