14 DAY TRIAL // There you have it. The piece of news that'll forever change the way you look at a squirrel or a cute, little bunny.
It turns out that, for the time being, some 320,000 virus species that scientists are yet to pin down and document are lurking in mammals worldwide.
Each of these viruses has the potential to spread to humans, courtesy of some more or less fancy genetic mutations, and cause a pandemic.
According to EurekaAlert, diseases such as SARS, the West Nile virus, HIV/AIDS, Ebola and the Avian influenza were all caused by viruses that originated in wildlife.
Hence the fact that thoroughly researching these 320,000 unknown virus species might not be such a bad idea.
Scientist Peter Daszak, PhD, argues that, contrary to what some might assume, having 320,000 anonymous viruses inhabit various corners of the world isn't as big a problem as some might think.
What he means is that we should all be thankful that there aren't millions of them.
“For decades, we've faced the threat of future pandemics without knowing how many viruses are lurking in the environment, in wildlife, waiting to emerge.”
“Finally we have a breakthrough – there aren't millions of unknown virus, just a few hundred thousand, and given the technology we have it's possible that in my lifetime, we'll know the identity of every unknown virus on the planet,” the researcher says.
By the looks of it, the cost for identifying these viruses would amount to an impressive $6.3 billion (€4.77 billion).
But then again, pandemics are far more expensive, so I suppose one such investment is more than worth it.