Watch Out For Wild Ones

孫繼艷

新型冠狀病毒肺炎是一種新發傳染病，它具有極強的傳染性和危害性。對于這種病毒的來源，目前的一些研究顯示，可能與蝙蝠和穿山甲等野生動物有關。這些野生動物到底有多“毒”，你知道嗎？

The COVID-19 has already made lots of people sick. Where does the virus come from？ Scientists say it probably came from bats.

Bats can carry and transmit（傳播）more than 60 viruses that can infect（傳染）humans， Live Science noted. They include the world’s deadliest viruses， such as Ebola and HIV. Due to their strong immune systems（免疫系統）， bats are able to host these viruses and not get sick. At the same time， the viruses keep developing inside the bats to create new variants（變體）. These variants can then infect new hosts， such as other wild animals.

Pangolins（穿山甲）， for example， might be an intermediate host（中間宿主）for COVID-19， according to a recent study by Chinese scientists. This means that bats might have given the virus to pangolins， with pangolins then spreading it to humans.

Wild animals like snakes， hedgehogs（刺猬）and bamboo rats also carry various viruses. But since they live in the wild， there should be little chance for humans to come into contact with them and get infected — unless the animals are eaten or used to make animal products. When people hunt， buy and eat wild animals， they can introduce viruses to the rest of the population.

But this doesn’t mean that we should kill wild animals. Each species has a role in the ecosystem（生態系統）and all of them are important in keeping a natural ecological balance. The lesson we can learn from disease outbreaks is to respect and protect animals and to live in harmony with them instead of hunting， killing， or eating them.