Science Alert Brazil’s bats are harboring a vast and diverse pool of coronaviruses, a new study finds, including a newly identified strain that may pose a danger to human health in the years to come. Scientists are taking the threat seriously and will soon conduct testing in a secure lab to see if the variant really could spill over to our own species.
The discovery is cause for concern because the strain is eerily reminiscent of the bat-borne virus behind Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) – a contagion that causes a very high case fatality rate of nearly 35 percent in humans.
Since its identification in 2012, the MERS coronavirus (MERS-CoV) has caused 858 known deaths, mostly in the Middle East, Africa, and South Asia. While mild cases are likely underreported, this virus holds the highest case fatality rate of all the known coronaviruses that can infect humans, making it the most lethal.
For comparison, the coronavirus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic, SARS‑CoV‑2, has a human case fatality rate of around 2 percent, according to a 2022 study.