Climate change has caused major changes in the temperature of the planet, in fact, a report by the UN meteorological agency estimates that there is a 50% chance that global warming will exceed 1.5ºC in the next five years. Given this, many animals have begun to move towards more favorable habitats, in most cases approaching areas inhabited by large human population centers. This is dangerous for two reasons, the first is that it increases the risk of wildlife attacks and second, it increases the risk of future pandemics.
And it is that, animals are carriers of harmful microorganisms that could jump to humans if they are close to them or have contact with the same objects in a space, as already happens with Ebola or Zika. This is what is thought to have happened with the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19, whose origin has been located in the market in the city of Wuhan (China).
A study from Georgetown University (USA) has linked climate change with an increased risk of viral transmission from animals to humans, mainly due to changes in habitat due to migrations to new areas with better living conditions, either by floods, drought or increased temperatures in their place of origin. And it is that experts project that, on this journey to new areas, when they meet other mammals for the first time they will share thousands of viruses.
The danger of bat migration
These changes provide greater opportunities for viruses like Ebola or coronaviruses to emerge in new areas, making them more difficult to track, and in new types of animals, making it easier for viruses to jump across a kind of “stepping stone” into animals. humans.
“The closest analogy is actually the risks that we see in the wildlife trade. We care about markets because bringing together unhealthy animals in unnatural combinations creates opportunities for this gradual process of emergence, like the way SARS jumped from bats to civets, and then from civets to people. But markets are no longer special; in a changing climate, that kind of process will be the reality in nature almost everywhere,” said Colin Carlson, one of the study’s researchers.
As the authors explain in the publication in the journal Nature, the planet has increased its temperature by up to 1.2ºC since 2021, which has caused animals to move from their usual areas. In addition, the limited efforts being made to reduce greenhouse gas emissions may not be enough to prevent increased contact between wildlife and humans.
Climate change will be the greatest risk factor for the appearance of diseases, surpassing deforestation, the wildlife trade and industrial agriculture
One of the things that the work warns is that the increase in temperature will have a strong impact on bats, an animal that can fly for various distances to remote areas where they share as much of the virus as possible. This is especially critical in areas such as Southeast Asia, where there is a large and highly diverse population of them.
“When a Brazilian free-tailed bat makes its way to Appalachia, we need to invest in knowing what viruses are accompanying it. Trying to detect these host jumps in real time is the only way we can prevent this process from causing more infections and more pandemics. We are closer than ever to predicting and preventing the next pandemic,” says Carlson.
In conclusion, the research indicates that climate change is going to become the greatest risk factor for the appearance of diseases, surpassing deforestation, the wildlife trade and industrial agriculture. The authors say that one possible solution to this problem would be to combine wildlife disease surveillance with real-time studies of environmental change.
.
