Climate change may have influenced the outbreak of the novel coronavirus as well as the 2002-03 SARS pandemic virus, suggesting a new study that says the global crisis prompted the release of greenhouse gases is could alter the distribution of bat species that carry these pathogens.
The study, published in the journal Science of The Total Environment, noted that the Yunnan region of southern China and neighboring regions in Myanmar and Laos are creating a global space of change-driven growth. climate in the richness of bats.
According to the scientists, including those from the University of Cambridge in the UK, this region coincides with the apparent ancestry of the bats of the two viruses – SARS-CoV-1 and SARS -CoV-2.
Based on earlier studies, the researchers said there is a strong correlation between the number of coronavirus families of viruses present in an area with local bat sex richness. As species richness increases, they said, there may be an increase in the likelihood of coronavirus (CoV) having potentially life-threatening features “present, transmitted or transmitted. growing in the area. ”
“Climate change is having an impact on species richness, which in turn will drive the geographical distribution of species by altering the suitability of ecological habitats, leading to species extinction in some areas and allow them to expand in others, ”the scientists in the study wrote. .
In the study, the researchers estimated how climate change has affected the richness of global bat species over the past century. They said that a global increase in climate abundance in bats in the region may be the origin that is probably from the bat ancestors of the novel coronavirus and the SARS virus.
“This provides a possible mechanical link between climate change and the emergence of both viruses,” the study said.
According to the scientists, there are areas around Central Africa, several scattered areas in Central and South America, and “especially a large spatial assemblage in China’s southern Yunnan region and the surrounding areas of Myanmar and Laos , ”Has seen a significant increase in the species richness of bats. as a result of climate change-driven field movements over the last century. They said in parts of Myanmar and Laos that about 40 species of bats are driven by climate change.
The scientists said this corresponds to an increase in the local number of bat-bat coronaviruses in the order of nearly 100 viruses, as each bat species carries around 2.67 CoV on average. “Given the potential built on by our analysis that global greenhouse gas emissions may have contributed to the SARS-CoV-1 and SARS-CoV-2 revolutions, we include calls for climate change mitigation, including as part of Covid-19 economic recovery programs, ”they wrote in the study.
However, the scientists clarified that future research using other models of vegetation change and species rotation is needed to confirm the pattern suggested in the study.
Commenting on the findings, Paul Valdes, Professor of Physical Geography at Bristol University in the UK, said “habitat loss may have played a much bigger role in biodiversity change than any small impact. from climate change and this is not included in their model. ”
Valdes, who was not involved in the study, believes it is premature to conclude from the available data that climate change influenced the emergence of the novel coronavirus. Kate Jones, Professor of Ecology & Biodiversity at University College London in the UK, has agreed.
According to Jones, the risk of new viruses leaking from animals is a complex interplay of not only ecological threat but human exposure and vulnerability. “It may turn out that an increase in human numbers, human movement and pollution of natural environments through agricultural expansion play a more important role in understanding the SARS-CoV-2 spill process,” she said.
Another scientist, Matthew Struebig, who was also not involved in the study, said in a statement that while the approach used in the analysis is “interesting”, the data on the distribution of bat species used in the analysis is “inconsistent at best” and “not particularly appropriate”. Struebig, who is affiliated to the University of Kent in the UK, said in a statement that “there should be more evidence of the evidence.”
He believes the study has “too many assumptions” to conclude that climate change was increasing the likelihood of both pandemic viruses appearing.