Psittacosis singer Philip Selway. Lena Rose Pepperdine died in 1930 of parrot fever. She was the first wife of George Pepperdine, the founder of Pepperdine University. Psittacosis Psittacosis—also known as parrot fever, and ornithosis—is a zoonotic infectious disease caused by a bacterium called "Chlamydophila psittaci" and contracted from infected parrots, such as macaws, cockatiels, and budgerigars, and pigeons, sparrows, ducks, hens, gulls and many other species of birds. The incidence of infection in canaries and finches is believed to be lower than in psittacine birds. In certain contexts, the word is used when the disease is carried by any species of
Contagious bovine pleuropneumonia establish the Bureau of Animal Industry, set up in 1884 to eradicate the disease, which it succeeded in doing by 1892. Louis Willems, a Belgian doctor, began pioneering work in the 1850s on animal inoculation against the disease. The bacteria are widespread in Africa, the Middle East, Southern Europe, as well as parts of Asia. It is an airborne species, and can travel up to several kilometres in the right conditions. Contagious bovine pleuropneumonia came to Australia on a shipment of five head of cattle from England in 1858, imported by one of Melbourne's earliest settlers Mr Boadle. Three weeks