June 20, 2008 | 0 comments

Humans Spreading Disease To Chimps

Some human diseases originate in animals, but it now appears that we have been infecting chimps with a respiratory virus. Karen Hopkin reports.

Listen to this podcast:

click to enable

Download this podcast
Subscribe via: RSS | iTunes
More 60-Second Science | All Podcasts

[The following is an exact transcript of this podcast.]

As you probably know, viruses can jump from animals to people. We’ve gotten flu from birds and pigs. And HIV, the virus that causes AIDS, is thought to have come from chimps. But swapping bugs is a two-way street. Because scientists from Virginia Tech have found that African chimps are coming down with human viruses.

The researchers have been studying chimps in the Mahale Mountain national park in Tanzania. And they’ve found that the apes are suffering from a respiratory illness that’s caused by a virus very similar to the one that causes bronchitis and pneumonia in people. The results will appear in the August issue of the American Journal of Primatology.

How and where the chimps caught this bug remains a mystery. But it’s possible they got it from scientists, or tourists, who frequent the park. The husband and wife research team, and their four-year-old daughter, have been living and working in the park for the past year in a state-of-the-art, eco-friendly field laboratory. There they hope to develop ways to monitor and protect the health of these endangered apes. Of course the best way to protect the chimps might be to remind visitors to sneeze into their sleeves and avoid being too simpatico with the simians.

—Karen Hopkin

60-Second Science is a daily podcast. Subscribe to this Podcast: RSS | iTunes

60-Second Science is a daily Podcast. Subscribe to this Podcast: RSS | iTunes

Read Comments (0) | Post a comment

You Might Also Like

Discuss This Article

Click here to submit your comment.

VIEW:



	Email:
	Name:
	Address:
	Address 2:
	City:
	State:

Subscription Center

Editor's Pick

Adapting to the Freshwater CrisisForward-thinking experts are getting a better handle on the growing global water shortage and coming up with innovative approaches to ensuring the security, safety and sustainability of this resource