How do bats spread disease globally?

Close-up of the path of virus infection from bats - the animal that has been dubbed the "Batman descendant" to humans.

>>>Warning of the bat virus causing death

Speaking of bats, we think of animals that are capable of flying beautifully in the dark night by positioning with ultrasound. But standing from a medical perspective, bats remind us of an animal with a superior immune system.

They are hosts of many dangerous viruses: from Hendra, Nipah, Marburg to Ebola, but do not have the disease caused by these viruses. Even with so many different paths, bats spread these viruses everywhere, turning people into victims.

Below, let's trace the path that this "Batman" animal has used to transmit viruses to humans.

The first step is that the bat "nourishes" more and more viruses that transmit different diseases. According to experts from the University of Pennsylvania, bats have good immune systems that are almost never attacked by viruses.

Therefore, they become excellent natural hosts. Viruses of many diseases live in the parasite, develop and change, just waiting for the day to be spread to humans and other organisms to cause disease only.

Next, the bat migrates to live near big cities, where the population is concentrated. In fact, they were originally wild species, preferring to live in a place without people. However, climate change and rapid urbanization speed make this species forced to go to cities where there is more food.

In some locations, statisticians say: the number of fruit bats has increased about 4 times in the last few years.

Researchers have also demonstrated that a large number of bats gradually cease to eat food in the wild. Instead, they switched to finding available food in the landfill.

This means their food quality decreases, bats are more exposed to viruses and humans.

Most viruses are present in bat saliva. Therefore, when both bats share food, the risk of virus infection from one bat to another is very high.

As a result, many individuals at the same time contain virus. If these viruses infect humans, they can cause a major pandemic, as the number of bats in the world keeps increasing.

After eating, bats are released into the feces and urine. For fruit bats, we can easily find their waste under different stumps. And certainly, the virus causes it, waiting for an opportunity to infect people.

Grass is usually very developed in areas where there are many bat manure. It is also where people often graze cattle. Experts Raina Plowright and colleagues point out that as long as cows, horses or any cattle drinking water or eating grass contaminated with bat droppings will become vectors of the virus.

In Malaysia, Nipah virus has spread to pigs after it has eaten fruit pulp contaminated with bat manure. In Central Africa, some gibbons are thought to be the vectors of transmitting Ebola virus to humans after eating fruits that bats once ate.

After the virus invades an animal, they have a chance to attack the whole herd. Typically like horses, this is a species that has a regular "communication" behavior among the herds. This feature makes the virus spread faster with dizzying speed.

In horses, some individuals have the ability to remove infections in the mucous membranes of the respiratory tract. But the rest is not and becomes the intermediate host containing the virus.

When exposed to them, the owners of these horses in particular and other livestock in general are at high risk.

Eventually, viruses from some people will spread to others around them through direct contact with body fluids such as saliva, blood, urine, and feces . This process usually happens very quickly.

Typically Ebola virus has quickly burst into a major epidemic, causing horrors for all mankind. Part of the reason is that the virus in the body usually does not get sick immediately. When symptoms appear outside, it is when the virus has been transmitted to many others.

Reference: Discovery