Regional climate changes drive life-threatening zoonotic disease outbreaks
NewsAug 07, 2023
In a medical first, a neurosurgeon performing a biopsy on an Australian woman last year pulled an 8 cm (3.15 in) living parasitic worm from her brain, according to findings published in the Emerging Infectious Diseases journal.
The patient, a 64-year-old woman, had complained of symptoms such as stomach pain, night sweats, and a cough, later progressing to forgetfulness and depression. A brain scan revealed what appeared to be "an atypical lesion" on the right frontal lobe of her brain.
As we emerge from the COVID pandemic, the world needs to be aware of a new frontier of infectious diseases being driven by population growth and climate change. Research shows that an acceleration of climate change will cause more parasites to spill over into the human population. Unless we take bold action to mitigate environmental damage, novel infections like this will become more common.
While diseases that travel from animals to humans are on the rise, science will always be able to provide us with new ways of mitigating the damage. For instance, research done in Africa has found that ants can house a multitude of viral sequences unknown to science. It's just as often that nature poses a problem as it does a solution, and the intense focus on zoonosis in the aftermath of COVID could leave us well-prepared.