Melting Arctic permafrost could release an ancient zombie virus and trigger a devastating global health emergency, concerned scientists say.
“We are now facing a significant threat and we need to be prepared to deal with it. It’s that simple,” geneticist Jean-Michel Claverie, emeritus professor of medicine and genomics at Aix-Marseille University, told The Guardian.
Experts are already working with the University of the Arctic, an international education and research cooperative, to create a monitoring network to help identify cases of disease caused by the ancient micro-organism at an early stage — before it spreads out of control.
The network will also provide quarantine facilities and medical services for those infected to help minimize potential outbreaks, including preventing infectious patients from leaving the region.
The so-called Methuselah microbes, also known as zombie viruses, are able to remain viable for tens of thousands of years encased in frozen soil, which covers almost 20% of Earth’s northern hemisphere.
“The important part about permafrost is that it’s cold, dark and oxygen-poor, which is perfect for preserving biological material,” Claverie said.
According to scientists, melting arctic permafrost could release “zombie” viruses that could cause an epidemic. Photo by MLADEN ANTONOV/AFP via Getty Images Geneticist Jean-Michel Claverie says zombie viruses are a “significant threat” that humanity must prepare for. SVFU
“You can put yogurt in permafrost and it might still be edible 50,000 years later.”
Scientists believe the deepest layers of permafrost could have preserved viruses that inhabited the Earth up to a million years ago – long before the most ancient human ancestors, who are believed to have first appeared on the planet about 300,000 years ago.
Therefore, modern humans have no natural immunity to prehistoric viral invaders.
“Our immune system may never come into contact with some of those microbes, and that’s another concern,” Claverie told the outlet. “The scenario of an unknown virus ever infecting Neanderthals back to us, although unlikely, has become a real possibility.”
Microorganisms are found in thawing permaforest. Jean-Michel Claverie/IGS/CNRS-AM Like monster movie zombies, research is increasingly concerned that viruses that have been dormant for tens of thousands of years may pose a threat. Getty Images
The prospect of ancient viruses escaping their icy prisons in the most remote regions of Earth and starting a new global pandemic sounds unlikely, but virologists believe there is at least room for concern.
“We don’t know what virus is in the permafrost but I think there is a real risk that there might be one capable of triggering a disease outbreak – say an ancient form of polio,” virologist Marion Koopmans of the Erasmus Medical Center in Rotterdam told the outlet.
“We have to assume that something like this can happen.”
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Source: thtrangdai.edu.vn/en/
