joxeloj t1_jbqwlcb wrote
I'm EXTREMELY skeptical this is a meaningful risk. Viruses infecting single cell organisms are extremely abundant in the environment but do not pose a threat to humans.
Viruses that infect humans or even mammals immensely less abundant, so very few if any will stand a chance of being preserved in this manner. It seems astronomically unlikely they would then make it back into a living host in sufficient numbers while still viable to achieve a productive infection. I imagine an infected carcass would have to freeze very quickly for viable viruses to be preserved, and then be consumed in large amounts fairly quickly to infect something.
Even if they did, they'd be less likely to achieve subsequent transmission relative to current viruses in active circulation and no more likely to be lethal/highly pathogenic. This just reads like a scary sentence you put at the ending of a basic microbiology paper to garner media coverage and win career points.
metalmaxilla t1_jbrdhts wrote
One of the examples that's always pondered is smallpox. If infected bodies buried in permafrost become exposed, could smallpox create an outbreak now that vaccination is no longer routine? A Russian group investigated this in the 1990s but the virus particles were too broken up to cause an infection. Still makes you wonder about the possibility if there was a specimen preserved just right or happened to still have intact and virulent virus.
[deleted] t1_jbrjn02 wrote
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merchant_of_mirrors t1_jbr8pj9 wrote
except that they've already found both virus and bacteria that were viable, so its not theory. As the permafrost melts, the likelihood of one emerging that can infect humans goes up, and as the area warms, you'll have more people living there and potentially becoming exposed to these pathogens.
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