In the wake of the first Nipah virus fatality with the demise of a 12-year-old boy in Kerala, experts are stressing on confirming the transmission source, as once it jumps from animals to humans, it could be fatal for those with high morbidity.
According to Dr Ashutosh Biswas, Professor, Department of Medicine at All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS), the virus is carried by fruit bats.
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“Fruit bats are the carriers of the virus, and they are the main cause of transmission. Fruit bats live in a specific geographical territory. If they fly to other places, naturally this virus can be transmitted. We don’t have specific treatment for the disease,” he told NDTV..
“So, we have to understand that this is a very serious disease and is associated with high morbidity and mortality,” he added.
Being a zoonotic disease, animals, including fruit bats, are its career, according to Dr Biswas.
“In the past, we have seen and observed in India, that the fruit bats can also transmit it to our domestic animals like pigs, goats, cats, horses, and others. So, the jumping of this virus from animals to humans is very dangerous, and is what we call a spillover,” he said.
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Stressing upon the importance of finding the source, he said, “Once this virus gets into human circulation, it starts to transmit from human-to-human and the transmission is so fast that it can spill over. Therefore, it is important to identify the source in the beginning. As indicated, most of the time, we have found that the transmission is from fruit bats.”
Adding that it all starts from eating a fruit without washing it, he said, “Eating the fallen half-eaten fruits, that too without washing them, is a very dangerous habit.”
According to the World Health Organization, the Nipah virus, carried by fruit bats, could potentially be fatal to human beings. Some of its symptoms include respiratory illness with fever, muscular pain, headache, fever, dizziness, and nausea.
“We have had two Nipah virus outbreaks before this one; once in Kerala, once in West Bengal. During the last outbreak, about 90 per cent of the infected persons died. Then in 2019, we had just 1 case of the virus, and now in 2021, we have got another case, a very fatal one. So, it is important to understand why it is happening,” Biswas said.