Global warming may “release” ancient viruses buried in permafrost – scientists

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Ancient viruses buried in the permafrost of the Arctic could one day be “released” by global warming and trigger a major disease outbreak.

This may threaten humanity with a new pandemic, scientists believe. They suggest that the new global emergency may be triggered by a disease from the distant past, writes The Guardian.

“Current analysis of pandemic threats focuses on diseases that may originate in southern regions and then spread northward. Instead, little attention has been paid to an outbreak that could start in the far north and then spread south.

This, in my opinion, is a failure, because there are viruses that can infect people and cause a new outbreak of the disease“, says French geneticist Jean-Michel Clavery.

A virus from permafrost that is 30,000 years old. Image: Jean-Michel Claverie

This thesis was supported by virologist Marion Koopmans from the medical center in Rotterdam.

“We don’t know what viruses are in the permafrost, but I think there’s a real risk that there might be one there capable of triggering an outbreak of disease – say, an ancient form of polio. We have to anticipate that something like this might happen“, she says.

In 2014, Clavery led a group of scientists who researched so-called “zombie viruses” in Siberia. It turned out that even after a thousand-year stay in permafrost, they can infect unicellular organisms.

Further research showed the existence of several different virus strains in seven different places in Siberia. The age of one of the samples was 48,500 years.

“The viruses we have studied do not pose a danger to humans. However, this does not mean that other viruses buried in permafrost cannot cause disease in humans. For example, we have identified genomic traces of poxviruses and herpesviruses (families of DNA-containing viruses – ed.), which are well-known human pathogens“, adds Clavery.

Permafrost covers one-fifth of the northern hemisphere and consists of soil that has been stored at temperatures below zero for a long time.

“The defining feature of permafrost is that it is cold, dark, and devoid of oxygen. It is an ideal environment for storing biological material. You Can Put Yogurt In Permafrost And It Could Be Edible In 50,000 Years“, Clavery notes.

But the permafrost of the world is changing. The top layers of the planet’s main reserves – in Canada, Siberia and Alaska – are melting as climate change disproportionately affects the Arctic.

According to meteorologists, the region is warming several times faster than the average growth rate of global warming.

However, according to Clevery, the biggest risk is the permafrost not melting. The danger arises from another impact of global warming – the disappearance of Arctic sea ice. This allows for increased shipping, transportation and industrial development in Siberia.

They are also planning large-scale mining operations there, during which they want to make huge holes in the deep permafrost to extract oil and ore. These operations will release a huge number of pathogens, scientists are convinced.

“If you look at the history of epidemic outbreaks, one of the key factors has been changes in land use. Virus Nipa spread by bats that people drove out of their habitats. Similarly, monkeypox is associated with the spread of urbanization in Africa.

And that’s what we’ll soon see in the Arctic: a complete land-use change could trigger another outbreak“, Marion Koopmans stressed.

Read also: Oxford has begun human trials of a vaccine against the rare Nipah virus

Scientists believe that permafrost at its deepest level may contain viruses that are up to a million years old.

For this reason, Clavery and other scientists are working on plans to create quarantine facilities and medical examiners that could pinpoint early cases of disease and treat them on the spot to contain the spread of infection.

“We are now facing a tangible threat, and we must be ready to deal with it“, Clavery summarized.

It will be recalled that Greenland loses 30 million tons of ice per hour.

Read also: No panic. What is “disease X” and why is everyone talking about it?

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