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The Conversation
The Conversation
Environment
Alison Peel, Senior Research Fellow in Wildlife Disease Ecology, Griffith University

To stop new viruses jumping across to humans, we must protect and restore bat habitat. Here's why

Grey headed flying fox (Pteropus poliocephalus) Vivien Jones, Author provided

Bats have lived with coronaviruses for millennia. Details are still hazy about how one of these viruses evolved into SARS-CoV-2, which causes COVID in humans. Did it go directly from bats to humans or via another animal species? When? And why? If we can’t answer these questions for this now-infamous virus, we have little hope of preventing the next pandemic.

Some bat species are hosts for other viruses lethal to humans, from rabies to Nipah to Hendra. But their supercharged immune systems allow them to co-exist with these viruses without appearing sick.

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