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ARS Home » Midwest Area » Ames, Iowa » National Animal Disease Center » Virus and Prion Research » Research » Publications at this Location » Publication #192877
Title: INTRODUCTION: CONCEPTUALIZING AND PARTITIONING THE EMERGENCE PROCESS OF ZOONOTIC VIRUSES FROM WILDLIFE TO HUMANS

Author
item CHILDS, JAMES - YALE SCHOOL OF MEDICINE
item Richt, Juergen
item MACKENZIE, JOHN - CURTIN UNIV TECH, PERTH

Submitted to: Current Topics in Microbiology and Immunology
Publication Type: Book / Chapter
Publication Acceptance Date: 8/10/2006
Publication Date: 10/2/2007
Citation: Childs, J.E., Richt, J.A., Mackenzie, J.S. 2007. Introduction: conceptualizing and partitioning the emergence process of zoonotic viruses from wildlife to humans. In: Childs, J.E., Mackenzie, J.S.; Richt, J.A., editors. Wildlife and Emerging Zoonotic Diseases: The Biology, Circumstances and Consequences of Cross-Species Transmission. Series: Current Topics in Microbiology and Immunology. Berlin Heidelberg: Springer-Verlag. 315:1-31.

Interpretive Summary:

Technical Abstract: The process of zoonotic disease emergence can be understood by coupling knowledge of how zoonotic viruses have evolved and are maintained among their wildlife hosts, transmitted across a species-barrier to cause productive infection in a taxonomically distinct secondary host, initiate a pathologic process causing disease, and, by repetitive infection within the secondary host species, result in incident morbidity or mortality of sufficient magnitude to be detected and characterized as a novel heath concern of local, regional, or global significance. Obviously, we possess no such knowledge for any zoonotic virus or zoonotic disease, but casting the emergence process in this context underscores how disciplinary boundaries are blurred; advances require approaches spanning the spectrum of biological inquiry, and solutions to imminent threats require approaches unbounded by the notion of specific scientific discipline. The emergence process involves ecological interactions at the individual, species, community, and global scale. The dynamic circumstances and relative importance of the participants reflect the evolutionary context in which zoonotic agents have accommodated to, and been accommodated by, their reservoir hosts, the diversity of species involved, their geographic range and their local dispersion. In turn, historical factors have modified and blurred traditional patterns of species distribution, abundance, and diversity, and are continually transforming the landscape of opportunity on which zoonotic viruses with their reservoir hosts mingle with novel, potentially susceptible secondary host species (H*S)s. The current historical circumstances are unprecedented in their efficiency for continually shuffling an expanding repertoire of zoonotic viruses and hosts, introducing them in novel ecologic circumstances to a wealth of previously-unavailable and unexplored niches. Within the last decade the accelerated pace of rapid translocations of infected reservoir hosts or host species have heralded a sea change in how we view the public health threat posed by zoonotic viruses, as testified by the emergence of SARs coronavirus (SARS CoV), Influenza A subtype H5N1, West Nile virus (WNV), Nipah virus (NiV), and Monkeypox virus.