Who's ready for some more Ebola?

[StillSleepy]

A new Ebola outbreak [CNN] in the Equateur province in the northwestern part of the DRC has killed five people out of nine total infected between 18-30 May.

The eastern part of the country was already dealing with an Ebola outbreak that started in 2018 and hasn't had a new case for 21 out of the 42 days required to declare it over. 42 days represents two incubation cycles of the virus.

On top of that, the country is battling both COVID-19 and a massive measles outbreak.

 

[The Atheist]

Yeah, I read that yesterday. Bad things come in threes in the DRC.

Let's just hope someone doesn't catch all three and give birth to a new, improved virus - with ebola symptoms, the infectiousness of measles, and the pre-symptomatic transmission of Covid.

News about countries outside the OECD or Brazil is pretty sparse these days.

 

[HansMustermann]

Viruses are not bacteria, though. Bacteria do exchange plasmids (basically, bacteria chromosomes), so at least theoretically you could end up with something that combines the black death genes, the cholera genes, and the MRSA antibiotic resistance, if they're together. Viruses don't do that. Even if you somehow ended up with the same cell infected with two different viruses, before it's destroyed one way or another, there's almost no way that the capsid would combine correctly around a mix of both payloads.

 

[cjameshuff]

Viruses are not bacteria, though. Bacteria do exchange plasmids (basically, bacteria chromosomes), so at least theoretically you could end up with something that combines the black death genes, the cholera genes, and the MRSA antibiotic resistance, if they're together. Viruses don't do that. Even if you somehow ended up with the same cell infected with two different viruses, before it's destroyed one way or another, there's almost no way that the capsid would combine correctly around a mix of both payloads.

It might not be as common, but does happen:
https://arstechnica.com/science/202...hybrid-of-viruses-from-two-different-species/

But these three are sufficiently different that it's overwhelmingly unlikely for an interaction to lead to a functional virus, as you said. COVID-19 looks like a cross between a bat coronavirus and a near-identical pangolin coronavirus.

 

[HansMustermann]

It might not necessarily be a cross per se. It can be just a mutation from a common ancestor of both.

 

[StillSleepy]

Measles would be unlikely to benefit another virus, it has a somewhat simple genome. I am of the understanding that this is part of why measles vaccines tend to be effective for a few decades, as the virus typically cannot evolve around our defenses without significant trade-offs that tend to render it harmless.

 

[Ulf Nereng]

This year will go into the history books as The Omnidisaster Year.

 

[The Atheist]

Measles would be unlikely to benefit another virus, it has a somewhat simple genome.

I thought people would realise that comment was a joke.

This year will go into the history books as The Omnidisaster Year.

Apparently, the hurricane season is supposed to ramp up quite solidly this northern summer as well.

Anyone checked the Jellystone caldera lately?

 

[Jim_MDP]

I thought people would realise that comment was a joke.







Apparently, the hurricane season is supposed to ramp up quite solidly this northern summer as well.



Anyone checked the Jellystone caldera lately?

And Mt St. Helens is looking a tad frisky again.
[emoji20]

 

[Ulf Nereng]

And Mt St. Helens is looking a tad frisky again.
[emoji20]

Climatologists are predicting record heat this year so I'll go out on a limb and predict record bushfires in California this year.

ETA: Unless Trump orders the military to rake the forests preventatively!

 

[The Atheist]

Scientists believe the current outbreak came from an Ebola Mary, who's been positive for 5 years and passing the disease on.

https://arstechnica.com/science/202...e-for-5-6-years-before-sparking-new-outbreak/