Since 1986, the Asian elephant has been listed as Endangered on the IUCN Red List, as the population has declined by at least 50 percent over the last three elephant generations, which is about 60–75 years. It is primarily threatened by loss of habitat, habitat degradation, fragmentation and poaching. Asian Elephants also face another series of dangers, that of traumatization from human related activities, including but not limited to, land mines, snares, and logging / road traffic accidents, leaving individual elephants severely disabled with missing limbs. Not only is the underlying cause of such incidents traumatic for the elephant at the time of the injury but given that life span of Asian Elephants is more than half a century, the elephants must manage with their injury for the remainder of their lives. This elephantprosthetics.org website is dedicated to creating awareness of the extent of the problem, the underlying causes, as well as helping individual traumatized Asian Elephants overcome their disability with the fitting of prosthetic (artificial) limbs over their lifetime.
