More evidence links SARS to bats

Many  species  of  bats  found  across  China  are  infected  with  viruses  similar  to  the  SARS  virus,  an  international  team  of  researchers  reported  Thursday.

Zhengli  Shi  of  the  Chinese  Academy  of  Sciences  in  Beijing  and  colleagues  sampled  more  than  400  bats  of  various  species  across  China  and  found  up  to  70  percent  of  some  species  showed  evidence  of  infection  with  SARS-like  viruses.

This  would  support  the  idea  that  bats  are  the  reservoir  --the  natural  host  --  of  the  virus.  Animals  that  act  as  reservoirs  carry  and  spread  a  virus  without  themselves  becoming  ill.

Severe  acute  respiratory  syndrome  or  SARS  first  emerged  in  China  in  2002  and  in  2003  spread  around  the  world  via  jet,  killing  more  than  700  people  and  infecting  about  8,000.  Strict  quarantines  and  other  measures  stopped  its  spread.

It  is  caused  by  a  new  virus  called  SARS  coronavirus.  Coronaviruses  are  common  in  people  and  animals  and  usually  cause  nothing  more  serious  than  a  cold.

Animals  such  as  palm  civets  were  found  to  be  infected  but  study  showed  they  were  not  the  true  reservoir  of  the  SARS  virus.

Earlier  this  month  a  team  of  Hong  Kong  researchers  reported  that  bats  found  in  Hong  Kong  carried  a  virus  very  similar  to  the  SARS  virus.

They  said  the  horseshoe  bats,  used  both  as  food  and  in  Chinese  medicine,  should  be  handled  with  great  care.

Shi,  Wendong  Li  and  colleagues  studied  other  bats  found  in  four  different  parts  of  China.  They  found  that  anywhere  between  28  percent  and  71  percent  of  the  bats,  depending  on  the  species  and  location,  had  evidence  of  infection  with  a  SARS-like  coronavirus.  Theirs  was  different  from  the  virus  found  by  the  Hong  Kong  researchers,  they  said.

“A  plausible  mechanism  for  emergence  from  a  natural  bat  reservoir  can  be  readily  envisaged,”  they  wrote  in  their  report,  published  in  the  journal  Science. (责任编辑：泉水)

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More evidence links SARS to bats