Quotes from David Quammen

Zoonoses from wildlife represent the most significant, growing threat to global health of all EIDs

Un individuo humano puede elegir no consumir savia de palma, no comer carne de chimpancés, no montar las pocilgas a la sombra de los mangos, no limpiar la tráquea de los caballos con las manos desnudas, no tener sexo sin protección con prostitutas, no compartir aguja, no toser sin taparse la boca, no subirse con síntomas a un avión o no poner a las gallinas y a los patos en el mismo corral.

It testified, I suppose, to the genderless ferocity of her mind." "Why

Dicho de la manera más tajante: las presiones y disrupciones ecológicas de origen humano sitúan a los patógenos animales en contacto creciente con las poblaciones humanas, al tiempo que nuestra tecnología y comportamiento diseminan esos patógenos cada vez más amplia y más rápidamente.

Estará la próxima gran pandemia causada por un virus? ¿Saldrá de un bosque tropical o de un mercado en el sur de China? ¿Matará a treinta o cuarenta millones de personas?

It worries the flu scientists because they know that H5N1 influenza is (1) extremely virulent in people, with a high lethality though a relatively low number of cases, and yet (2) poorly transmissible, so far, from human to human. It'll kill you if you catch it, very likely, but you're unlikely to catch it except

Invadimos los bosques tropicales y otros espacios salvajes, que albergan una enorme cantidad de especies de animales y plantas; y en el seno de estas criaturas, multitud de virus desconocidos. Talamos árboles; matamos animales o los enjaulamos para enviarlos a los mercados. Alteramos ecosistemas y provocamos que los virus escapen de sus huéspedes naturales. Cuando esto ocurre, los virus necesitan un nuevo huésped. A menudo, ese huésped somos nosotros.

Zoonotic pathogens can hide. That's what makes them so interesting, so complicated, and so problematic.

She is one of this new breed of cross-trained disease specialists I've mentioned, veterinarian-ecologists who recognize the intimate connectedness of human health, wildlife health, livestock health, and the habitats we all share. For

RNA viruses because I already had that list in my mind: Hendra and Nipah, Ebola and Marburg, West Nile, Machupo, Junin, the influenzas, the hantas, dengue and yellow fever, rabies and its cousins, chikungunya, SARS-CoV, and Lassa, not to mention HIV-1 and HIV-2. All of them carry their genomes as RNA. The

weighing only five grams (about the same as two dimes)

To say again: One in every four species of mammal is a bat.

Everything comes from somewhere, and strange new infectious diseases, emerging abruptly among humans, come mostly from nonhuman animals.

The stability of species represented the bedrock of natural history.

We all make our deals with life. We do it invisibly, sometimes unconsciously, and alone, without benefit of collective bargaining, We come to terms.

The protein wrap is known as a capsid. The

As long as H5N1 is out there in the world," Webster said, "there is the possibility of disaster. That's really the bottom line with H5N1. So long as it's out there in the human population, there is the theoretical possibility that it can acquire the ability to transmit human-to-human." He paused. "And then God help us.

A zoonosis is an animal infection that's transmissible to humans.

Penicillin works by preventing bacteria from building their cell walls. So do its synthetic alternatives, such as amoxicillin. Tetracycline works by interfering with the internal metabolic processes by which bacteria manufacture new proteins for cell growth and replication.

A reservoir host is a species that carries the pathogen, harbors it chronically, while suffering little or no illness.

Ningún otro primate ha tenido nunca el peso que ponemos sobre el planeta en semejante grado. En términos ecológicos, somos casi una paradoja; gran tamaño y vida prolongada, pero abundantes hasta lo grotesco. Somos una plaga.

The basic point is so important I'll repeat it: RNA viruses mutate profligately.

The event of transmission, when a pathogen passes from one kind of host to another, is called spillover.

R0 = ?N/(? + b + v)