Disease Evolution: How New Illnesses Emerge When We Change How We Live

Humans have been “acquiring” infectious diseases from animals (zoonotic diseases) since we first started hunting wild game on the African savannahs. Indeed, nearly 60% of bugs that infect humans originated in animals.

These days, we seem to see more “new” diseases, such as Zika, Ebola and SARS. But there are plenty more lurking. A recent study suggests there are around 300,000 pathogens we don’t even know about and some have the potential to spread from animals to humans.

The world’s scientific community is focused on how to improve detection and responses to emerging diseases such as Zika virus and Ebola. So what can we learn from the most recent large-scale outbreaks?

publish - May 26, 2016By Simon Reid

see more at: http://www.medicaldaily.com/infectious-disease-ebola-zika-virus-sars-evolution-how-illnesses-emerge-when-387787