With the pandemic, our fear of viruses has become more entrenched. Our most recent encounters with the virosphere are with SARS-CoV-2.
An animal host provided changes in a population of viruses that made them able to infect humans a few generations ago. Angiotensin converts ACE2 (or Akt 2) into an active receptor in our cells, allowing this newly emerging virus to attach readily.
Akt is a protein hormone responsible for regulating blood pressure and fluid balance. Many mammals produce ACE2, and we build it predominantly in our guts and lungs.
It is perhaps therefore, unsurprising that nearly 94% of its genes are found in humans and other animals-in other viruses, bacteria, slugs, and small mammals. It, however, has a few genes whose functions are not yet known.
Once SARS-CoV-2 can enter our bodies, it is difficult to predict how it will behave. We’ve been lulled into believing we can control nature and subdue it due to our ability to obtain instant (even if temporary) gratification.
Nature serves us selectively and indefinitely, and we choose which relationships we will cultivate and which we will terminate.
Brinker like this gives us the impression we can control nature, but we have slowly realized that this is a delusion. There is a point in time when we stop viewing nature as a pliable variable or an impediment to ‘progress’ or a means of one-upping one another.
There is a controversy about the origin of SARS-CoV-2-did the virus jump from an animal to unsuspecting buyers in a wet market, or was it released from a laboratory? Did it have a bioweapons design? These questions are relevant only if we are courageous enough to take corrective action and hold institutions or governments responsible.
A futile blame game would be best left to politicians and diplomats. For science, determining the virus’s lineage and identifying its potential hosts will help us plan future strategies if this information helps us determine its origin.
SARS-CoV-2 reminds us that nature can react to unimaginable levels when provoked beyond a point. It is an enormous, the world-scale biogeochemical reactor begins with minor elements. Soils, detritus, mud, mulch, sand, gravel, grit, rock, ocean currents, wind movement, and the shapes and sizes of landmasses life forms, are crucial parts of climate change.
The small pieces of the Earth’s engine come together when they are all put together. Microbes are the minor components. There are 1029 infections caused by viruses every day (one billion each second).
Viruses and microbes enable speciation and evolve new entities within ecosystems they have shaped, just as geological processes do. Tropical forests, vast grasslands, small pools, and even microbiomes within people are examples of ecosystems that have evolved thousands and even millions of years over time.
Microbes and minerals are the bedrock of continual interactions among life forms in an ecosystem.
Microorganisms are not only engines of evolution, but they are also capable of metabolizing, producing, breaking down, recycling, reformulating and synthesising chemicals faster and more efficiently than any machine ever created by humans. In creating new varieties of life, they tinker with and shuffle genes at great speed. To manage future pandemics and mitigate climate change, a better understanding of the microbial world is critical.
Each microbiome is unique and closely related to its surroundings. Our bodies have microbiomes flourishing in every fluid, tissue, and organ of our body; these microbes generally do more good than harm to us. The brain and spinal fluids, the heart, and the kidneys are all places within our bodies that harbour specific viruses.
Even the most advanced scientific efforts cannot restore an ecosystem to its original state if it has been harmed or insulted repeatedly. SARS-CoV-2 was also a chance occurrence, just as any other persistent pathogen.
Through habitat destruction and wildlife trade, we enabled its crossover. The spread of the novel virus was accelerated by the mass movement of people, weak and bigoted science, fragmented agency response, and discord between states once the outbreak occurred.
By monitoring small mutations in the virus’s 29,903-letter RNA code (our DNA has nearly 3 billion letters, whereas E. coli’s genome contains 4.6 million), virologists have been able to track the viral epidemic worldwide.
There is an average difference of ten RNA letters between each COVID virus isolated from any patient anywhere in the world. Several variants of the virus also vanish due to such slight changes, making the virus more infectious or more transmissible. Variants are created when a few mutations occur, and a distinct species is formed when several mutations arise together.
A new strain develops as soon as the virus crosses several populations and faces new challenges (drugs used in treatment, for example). A long way still separates SARS-CoV-2 from other viruses.
In any case, humans are infecting dogs, cats, tigers, minks and other animals with rabies. In its uncharted journey, SARS-CoV-2 is likely to open paths for other microbes to infest and colonise our microbiomes, thereby changing their and our fates.
SARS-CoV-2 is not just an isolated event but a tremendous opportunity for evolution. It will take some time to recover from the pandemic. There is no doubt that the virus has led to massive changes in our bodies and society that will last for quite some time. They may last forever.
Pandemics again demonstrate why we still know so little about the microbial world and how difficult it is to keep up with it with human technology. Each year, new viruses are discovered.
The number of viruses living in our lungs has increased by one since 2014, and in the last count, at least 20 viruses reside within the respiratory tract. The virus outnumbers or even outmatches us.
Despite the threats microbes pose (and viruses in particular), we have to find a way to make peace with them. Because we’re living in a time when we’re trying to make amends for our past misdeeds, perhaps we should begin to appreciate and recognize the microbes.
To me, it is surprising how even the most erudite scientists, famous science writers, broadcasters, doctors and public health experts mislabel microbes and the minutiae with terms like “bug”, “critter”, “pest” and “intruder”.
To begin, perhaps we ought to honour microbes appropriately. The war we are fighting with microbes and viruses has already ended. This invisible force, which causes disruptions and binds all life, is supposedly at war with us.
edited and proofread by nikita sharma
