As mentioned previously, there are hundreds of zoonotic diseases, so even just listing them would be too much for a short course. Therefore, another way to go about it is to classify them into groups and give just a few examples of individual diseases. One obvious way to classify is by the type of organism such as bacterial, viral, parasitic, etc. This classification was mentioned in the introductory section. Another way to classify is by how the disease is acquired, such as foodborne, inhaled, wounds, etc. Other ways to group them is by the animals or source from which they originate—we will use this means of classification in this section.
The groups covered here are zoonoses originating from:
- Domestic animals such as cows, sheep, and other farm animals
- Companion animals such as dogs, cats birds, etc.
- Wildlife: mammals
- Wildlife: fish and other aquatic animals
- Non-vertebrates such as insects
Please note that some zoonoses can be transmitted by a number of different types of animals and disease transmission can go both ways.
