Giant Virus

Giant Virus

I was reading an article in the press today that scientists have discovered some sort of giant virus in the ice of Siberia, that dates back some 30’000 years. Having tested it, it turns out the virus was still active, and able to infect an amoeba.

Now that stuff scares the crap out of me. We have absolutely no idea how that could impact us, and should it prove able to infect humans we could be in a lot of trouble. I think what is really a concern is that we could very easily unearth something like through say drilling for oil. Imagine a drilling that goes very deep. As the drilling equipment is brought back up, a dormant virus from 30’000 years is stuck to the equipment. Coming back to the surface, the virus suddenly awakes and is ready for some action. It rubs of to a worker who gets infected, but obviously does not know it. Something like that could spread out of control very fast.

Sometimes, nature can really throw us a twist. Keep in mind that things like anthrax occurs naturally in the soil, and you can imagine just what a 30’000 year old virus might do. I just hope those scientists that are messing around with it really take every single precaution available, and more…

Exactly!!