All posts tagged: viruses

What is hMPV, the virus spreading through China?

What is hMPV, the virus spreading through China?

Published by skeptic

Human metapneumovirus (hMPV) has probably been infecting people for centuries ROGER HARRIS/SCIENCE PHOTO LIBRARY Alarmist headlines that warn of China once again being overwhelmed by a mysterious new virus have dominated in the past few days. But the virus reported to be responsible for a surge in respiratory infections there, called human metapneumovirus, or hMPV, is actually neither mysterious nor new, and authorities in China have rejected claims that its health system is overwhelmed. What is human metapneumovirus? It is one of the many different viruses known as cold viruses because they infect the cells lining our respiratory tract, causing “common cold” symptoms, such as a sore throat, runny nose, coughing and sneezing, which may persist for a few days. You have almost certainly had an hMPV infection – studies of antibodies show that just about everybody gets infected by it by the age of 5. As with flu, people can be reinfected throughout their lives as immunity fades and new variants evolve. How dangerous is hMPV? In most people it only causes mild symptoms, …

Bird flu may be adapting to become more infectious to humans

Bird flu may be adapting to become more infectious to humans

Published by skeptic

Bird flu has been spreading in wild animals for years but it is now adapting to humans Vuk Valcic//SOPA Images/LightRocket via Getty Images The threat of the deadly H5N1 bird flu virus adapting to humans has been inching closer towards becoming a reality all year, and we may be nearing an inflection point. Three H5N1 cases in humans have happened in the very scenarios that public health officials are concerned could lead to a pandemic in people. “There is no clear evidence yet of human-to-human transmission, but I… Source link

Viruses may help store vast amounts of carbon in soil

Viruses may help store vast amounts of carbon in soil

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A bacteriophage virus can kill microbes, influencing what happens to the carbon their bodies contain nobeastsofierce Science/Alamy Viruses that infect other microbes may influence the movement of more than a billion tonnes of carbon in soil, according to the first attempt at quantifying their role in one of the planet’s main carbon stores. “While there are still gaps, we’re understanding that viruses can have a huge impact on soil carbon,” says Kirsten Hofmockel at Pacific Northwest National Laboratory in Washington state. Earth’s soils are packed with… Source link

Marburg virus: All your questions about the deadly disease outbreak answered

Marburg virus: All your questions about the deadly disease outbreak answered

Published by skeptic

A scanning electron micrograph of Marburg virus particles NIAID Rwanda is facing its first ever Marburg virus outbreak. Beginning in late September, 62 cases and 15 deaths had been reported by 17 October, mostly among healthcare workers in Kigali, the capital city. More than 800 contacts of infected people have been followed up in an effort to catch infections early and prevent further transmission, two of whom travelled to Belgium and Germany but were given the all-clear. As of October 21, no new cases or deaths had been reported in six days, but the threat of the outbreak hasn’t gone away. What is Marburg virus and what are its symptoms? Marburg virus is from the same family of viruses as those that cause Ebola, which are “among the most lethal pathogens known to infect humans”, according to a perspective article in The New England Journal of Medicine. They can cause similar symptoms, such as fever, chills and headache, as well as muscle aches and pains. Within a few days, people may develop a rash on …

Can Viruses Cheat? Cooperate? That’s What Sociovirologists Claim

Can Viruses Cheat? Cooperate? That’s What Sociovirologists Claim

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At Quanta, we learn from science writer Carl Zimmer that viruses live in communities “full of cheating, cooperation and other intrigues.” “For example, if you think of viruses as isolated packages of genes, it would be absurd to imagine them having a social life. But [Marco] Vignuzzi and a new school of like-minded virologists don’t think it’s absurd at all. In recent decades, they have discovered some strange features of viruses that don’t make sense if viruses are lonely particles. They instead are uncovering a marvelously complex social world of viruses. These sociovirologists, as the researchers sometimes call themselves, believe that viruses make sense only as members of a community.” Carl Zimmer, “Viruses Finally Reveal Their Complex Social Life,” Quanta, April 11, 2024 Coronavirus. The featured illustration above is monkeypox. Viruses are tiny infectious particles that consist of a very small genome — either DNA or RNA — inside a protein shell (capsid). They don’t have a metabolism; instead, an infected host cell’s metabolism makes copies of the virus, thus spreading it. There is an …

First mammal-to-human transmission of H5N1 ‘bird flu’ confirmed

First mammal-to-human transmission of H5N1 ‘bird flu’ confirmed

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Health authorities have called for increased monitoring of US farm workers at risk of catching H5N1, after genetic data confirmed the first instance of the virus jumping from mammals to humans.  In an official report published on Friday, health officials from the US Centres for Disease Control (CDC) said they found “strong evidence” that the Texan dairy worker who became infected with bird flu in March contracted the virus from a cow. “This would be the first reported case of mammal-to-human H5N1 virus transmission reported worldwide,” said the authors. Almost 900 people in 23 countries have been infected with the highly pathogenic strain of avian flu over the last two decades, but all previous cases have been linked to infected wild or kept birds. This latest development indicates the virus has better adapted to spread between mammals, sparking fears it may eventually evolve to transmit between humans – something which is of “enormous concern,” the World Health Organization has warned.  The report said anyone exposed to the virus “should be monitored,” and that those with …

The ‘100-day cough’ can be lethal in babies – so what is behind its global rise?

The ‘100-day cough’ can be lethal in babies – so what is behind its global rise?

Published by skeptic

Whooping cough might sound like a Victorian disease, but the bacterial infection has made a dramatic comeback in recent months across Europe, Asia, and America.  The ‘100-day cough’ – known clinically as pertussis – infects the lungs and respiratory system, causing severe coughing fits and flu-like symptoms that can persist for months.  Complications are particularly severe in infants under six months, where the infection can develop into pneumonia, seizures and, in some cases, death. Babies who survive may have long-term neurological or lung damage.  Whooping cough is cyclical and naturally peaks every three-to-five years. It is also endemic to all regions of the planet, according to the World Health Organization (WHO), meaning it occurs naturally in populations.  A jab – developed in the 1950s – helped to almost eliminate the disease in Britain.  But a steady decline in vaccine uptake coupled with a resurgence of respiratory diseases following Covid lockdowns have contributed to rapidly rising case numbers – with this year the worst on record since the mid-1980s. ‘This outbreak is huge’ In January and …

A one-shot vaccine for COVID, flu and future viruses? Researchers say it’s coming

A one-shot vaccine for COVID, flu and future viruses? Researchers say it’s coming

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At the beginning of the pandemic, many people hoped that infections with SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19 — or vaccines against the virus — would provide durable lifetime immunity, as is the case with diseases like measles or mumps. Instead, the COVID virus is more akin to the influenza virus, which mutates constantly and confers only short-term immunity. Both COVID and the flu require new and different vaccine formulas aimed at defeating newly circulating variants of the viruses. The inevitable result of this has been, for most of us, increasing vaccine fatigue.   But what if it were possible to protect against COVID and the flu, and other unknown viruses that haven’t yet emerged, with just one shot? If that became reality, seasonal or annual boosters would be part of the past. And what if such vaccinations didn’t even require a needle? While those possibilities may sound far in the future, scientists at the University of California, Riverside, believe they could become reality relatively soon — perhaps within the next five to 10 years. As illustrated in a …

New strain of mpox with ‘pandemic potential’ found in DRC mining town

New strain of mpox with ‘pandemic potential’ found in DRC mining town

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Named “clade 1b”, the virus appears to be better at spreading between people, predominantly via sexual contact, and has mutations that evade detection by some existing tests. “Without intervention, this localised Kamituga outbreak harbors the potential to spread nationally and internationally,” say the authors who found 108 confirmed cases of the new strain. “Given the recent history of mpox outbreaks in DRC, we advocate for swift action by endemic countries and the international community to avert another global mpox outbreak”.        The outbreak, which is described as having “pandemic potential”, raises unnerving questions: not only has the virus never been reported in the region before, but – unusually – it is spreading in an urban hub and predominantly infecting adults, especially sex workers.  “We’re seeing evolutionary changes within the virus that’s suggestive of increased human transmission… and we’re seeing the changing demographics in this one specific region of Congo,” said Dr Jason Kindrachuk, an associate professor in infectious disease at the University of Manitoba in Canada and co-author of the paper. “This is very important, because …

The Next Mass Extinction? | Oliver Whang

The Next Mass Extinction? | Oliver Whang

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In August 2023 dead elephant seals washed ashore on beaches in Argentina. First a handful appeared outside Rio Grande, a coastal city on the eastern side of the Tierra del Fuego archipelago. The next day there were more. Then the sightings moved up the seaboard, from Rio Gallegos to the Chubut province to Rio Negro to Buenos Aires. Park rangers saw pregnant seals head toward the shore, seize up in the water, spasm, and drown. Later that month, an Argentine veterinarian named Marcela Uhart traveled out to Península Valdés, a flat mushroom-shaped peninsula jutting into the Atlantic that serves as a popular seal breeding ground. Raised on a ranch in the pampas, Uhart has studied fauna in the region for nearly thirty years; she currently works in Patagonia for the University of California, Davis. Arriving at the peninsula, she found over a thousand dead seal pups, their bodies rotting into the sand. “It was surreal,” she told me last month. “The beach [was] filled with carcasses, scattered individuals, sick and dying, pups that were caught …