<Li> / ˌzoʊ. əˈnoʊsɪs / </Li> <Tr> <Th> Specialty </Th> <Td> Infectious disease </Td> </Tr> <P> Zoonoses are infectious diseases of animals (usually vertebrates) that can naturally be transmitted to humans . </P> <P> Major modern diseases such as Ebola virus disease and salmonellosis are zoonoses . HIV was a zoonotic disease transmitted to humans in the early part of the 20th century, though it has now evolved to a separate human - only disease . Most strains of influenza that infect humans are human diseases, although many strains of swine and bird flu are zoonoses; these viruses occasionally recombine with human strains of the flu and can cause pandemics such as the 1918 Spanish flu or the 2009 swine flu . Taenia solium infection is one of the neglected tropical diseases with public health and veterinary concern in endemic regions . Zoonoses can be caused by a range of disease pathogens such as viruses, bacteria, fungi and parasites; of 1,415 pathogens known to infect humans, 61% were zoonotic . Most human diseases originated in animals; however, only diseases that routinely involve animal to human transmission, like rabies, are considered direct zoonosis . </P>

Diseases carried from person to person through other hosts such as animals or insects are known as