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Climate Change Likely to Expand the Range of an Asian Bat and the Deadly Disease it Carries
A vaccine in development may slow the spread of Nipah virus, which kills up to 75 percent of the people it sickens, but reducing the environmental disruptions that bring people, livestock and bats together could be more effective.
By Chad Small
On May 3, 2018, a 26-year-old man living in the town of Perambra in the Indian state of Kerala went to the hospital complaining of fever and body aches. Muhammad Sabith’s symptoms did not seem serious enough for an overnight stay, so hospital staff sent him home after examining him. Two days later, he died. By the end of the month, 16 other people in Perambra had succumbed to the same illness—Nipah virus, spread by fruit bats throughout South and Southeast Asia.