The viruses found in these animals were then grown in culture, and genetic sequencing showed them to be identical to the human form of SARS except for a single additional gene sequence.
Twenty-five animals from eight species were examined, and no signs of SARS were detected in any other species. However, all six of the tested civets—which were from different owners—were found to be infected, as was the lone raccoon dog. (Although widely reported as “cats” in the western media, the palm civet merely resembles a cat and is more closely related to the mongoose. The raccoon dog however, is indeed from the dog family. Both are regularly eaten in Asia.) Only the single badger was tested. None of the animals showed any external signs of being unhealthy.
Without testing additional animals, it is impossible to know how common this virus is among those species, or to know the geographical distribution of infection. It is also unknown at this time if there is any link between the animal form of SARS and the spread of the human form. However the Associated Press has reported (here via ABC News) that 30% of the initial cases of SARS in Guangdong province were among animal handlers, a higher percentage than would be expected in a random sample.
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Meanwhile, professor Chandra Wickramasinghe of Cardiff University, apparently desperate for media coverage for his poorly-accepted theories (some of which really do have merit), suggested Friday a completely unverifiable and unsubstantiable “theory” that SARS came to Earth on a comet or meteorite. He also attributes most other epidemics in recent times, such as the Plague of Athens and the influenza pandemic of 1917-1919, to spaceborne viruses, which just happen to inexplicably share genetic markers with those which originated here, and just happen to be able to interact with living cells on Earth.
This story has been picked up by dozens of news sources. Most scientists, being unfortunately polite, refrain from stating that Wickramasinghe is outright crazy, and instead, like Dr. Julie Gerberding, director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, simply say things like, “We have many hypotheses that are far more plausible than meteorites.” However, some are more direct, like Lynn Rothschild, a space biologist at the NASA Ames Research Center. She said, “It’s just not credible. To be a successful parasite you have to know your system. You can’t just go in and invade and expect things to work.”
Update [2003-5-24 10:50:37 by Bob]: Finally, now that this story is drawing more (completely undeserved) attention, some scientists are coming out with harsher responses to Wickramasinghe’s “theory.” In today’s Albuquerque Tribune, a scientist from the University of New Mexico sums up the situation nicely. “These are actually prestigious guys with a history of wild ideas,” Horton Newsom, a scientist at the UNM Institute of Meteorites, said. “That just goes to show you what some people can get away with when they have tenure.”
This isn’t the first time Cardiff Center has been in the news promoting extraterrestrial “bugs”. We ran a pretty interesting (well, I think so, but then, I wrote it) article last December about their claim that high-altitude dust samples held alien microorganisms. These guys shoot all over the place, maybe they’ll hit on something. Their group also claims to have found a bacterium that causes cancer. They also have some pretty interesting things to say about the discovery of penecillin, streptomycin, extreme pleomorphism,and doing rebel science in general.
Let me just say thanks, Bob, for doing the SARS article this site has needed for some time. I’ve kinda shied away from doing one because the SARS saga just seems to go on and on and on and it’s more of a straightforward medical story than something with a sci-fi / cutting edge science story. I’ve got no problem with conventional medical stories here, ran quite a few of them myself, but I could never figure out how to write a story about SARS that would be self contained and wrapped up in a nice sorta-one-time only package. Your Little Fuzzy / “it-came-from-outer-space” angle for the story is perfect. I learned something totally new myself about the existance of civits and raccoon dogs on a reading tangent from SARS, which is exactly one of the growing hallmarks of this site I want to cultivate most. You pulled the trigger at just the right time with just the right story angle. Bravo!
…perhaps Professor Wickramasinghe is really the reincarnation of another famous scientist who was discredited for theorising that Earths troubles came from outer space.
I think scifitoday is a great source for science news I just couldn’t find anywhere else, I read it daily and im sorry my first comment is criticism – but when I read a science site I want to read objective stuff like science is meant to be, not someone ranting their personal opinions and calling people Oddballs – thats for slashdot and kuroshin!
Why couldn’t SARS have come from space? Every organic object on the planet could ultimately be derived from something that fell to earth from space. You can’t disprove this any more than you can prove it..
And about a bacterium causing cancer.. err, why not? The most common cancer in women, cervical cancer is caused by a virus. At least 3 other common cancers are caused by virii. 20 years ago you would have been laughed at for saying that. So, why not bacteria too?
replying to my own post.. now that’s style for you ;)
I havent read the links, so these people maybe saying crazy stuff indeed but from what I have seen it is at least plausible… however if they say SARS came from space via Michael Jackson whom the aliens abducted, then maybe I’ll change my ideas ;)
regardless, I forgot to mention keep up the good work with sci-fi today!
I’m glad you posted! You raise an important point. You should create an account here, we could use more posts like yours!
Here’s why I consider Wickramasinghe an oddball scientist, and use quotation marks when talking about his “theory.”
One needs to keep in mind that in order for a theory to be considered scientific, there are certain criteria it needs to meet. It needs to be consistent with all facts, contradicted by no facts, and must survive experiments designed to prove it false.
There are problems with Wickramasinghe’s SARS “theory” on all of these fronts.
As Lynn Rothschild said, an organism developed entirely outside of Earth would not even likely be biologically compatible, let alone capable of acting as a parasite here. Incidentally, this same problem frequently makes its way into science fiction—for example, in interspecies mating, such as Klingons with humans, which may be why people so easily accept it (for a great scientific take on this subject, see page 64 of Lawrence M. Krauss’ book Beyond Star Trek, a follow-up to his book The Physics of Star Trek).
Of course Wickramasinghe can use his other proposals to claim that life on Earth may have originally come from the same outer-space source as the comet or meteorite that suddenly brought SARS here. But even granting his thesis that life originated from space, you have to discount all of evolutionary biology for that to work, for life on Earth has changed considerably since it first appeared, again making a newly-introduced space virus incompatible.
This is a classic example of a closed-system, where the tenets are all self-supporting. Rather than working from the existing base of scientific knowledge, he carefully constructs a system where links to or from our tremendous accumulated base of scientific knowledge are conspicuously missing.
By Wickramasinghe designing his “theories” such that they cannot be tested, it becomes difficult to seriously call it them “theories” at all; instead they become something that can only be accepted without proof. And, of course, that is not science, it is faith.
What happened was that one news outlet wrote a story on Wickramasinghe’s “theory” and it got picked up and carried all over the web and by various media outlets. It was even stuck on the front page of Google News for several days, lending it an air of credibility it didn’t deserve. Unfortunately many of the authors of the news stories didn’t have a scientific background to see the problems with it, some just reworded the original wire stories, and some didn’t even bother to present the far more prevalent opposing view. When they started interviewing other scientists, the truth started to come out, and in the end, most news outlets got it right.
The media has a responsibility to ensure that the stories they write are not misleading. By presenting Wickramasinghe’s “theory” as something under serious scientific consideration, just because of his position as a scientist, they misled the public.
At SFT/SciScoop, we have the unique opportunity to write from a more scientific perspective than you might find in your daily newspaper, and to write meta-articles: articles about articles, that were often not written from a scientific point of view. When talking as a scientist, it’s important to be honest. For the best, and clearest, explanation I’ve ever seen on that point, read Cargo Cult Science, a commencement address given in 1974 by Richard P. Feynman (whom I coincidentally mentioned just today in this story on the solar eclipse). To have simply presented Wickramasinghe’s “theory” here on equal grounds with the WHO’s animal-link discovery, implying it, too, was scientific, would have been misleading—and reckless.
For the record, let me say I intend absolutely no disrespect for members of the Cardiff staff when they make profound claims, even if I use tongue-in-cheek sensationalistic words to describe their efforts. I personally think their “Andromeda Strain” theory for extraterrestrial origin of high altitude microbes, especially SARS, is probably wrong. However, if they can gather the (as Carl Sagan would say, extrodinary levels of) proof for their exraordinary claims, I’m all ears. Bacteria causing cancer? Extreme pleomorphism? Historical corrections and amplifications on antibiotic discoveries? Hey, I say go for it big time. Rebel scientists in the end are the ONLY ones who cause science to advance. They are invaluable and I’d rather follow the work of one true rebel scientist than 100 lab bench drones. Unfortunately, for every true rebel there are X quacks. That’s why scepticism rather than unabashed cheerleading is appropriate when dealing with this group as a whole. The true rebel scientist can take the heat and come out of the kitchen with a new kind of delicious meal for all of us to feast on. I’m hungry and wish them well.
I agree, get a username and post more!!! If noting else, we haven’t gotten a new member in a coupla days and I’m starting to worry the new member signup page is broken or something…