There are more online articles than I could list that have inaccuracies about bats. Usually I just grimace and ignore them, but this one from the Boston Globe the other day got me riled up enough to actually write a response. The article "Ebola response shows flaws in US system" focuses mainly on human capabilities of dealing with the introduction of a novel pathogen to the US. It only briefly touches on the role of wildlife as the reservoir for many zoonotic diseases (those that can be transmitted from animals to humans). The sentence that got my attention/made me cringe was, "Ebola is thought to originate in fruit bats that bite primates." (my emphasis added). Here is the response I wrote back to the article's author, in the hopes that she would correct that sentence. No dice.
Dear Ms. Freyer,
Thank you for your recent article in the Globe about the Ebola response in the US. I am a PhD student at the University of Georgia studying emerging diseases in fruit bats, and have followed the Ebola outbreak with interest.
I had one comment to make regarding your statement that "Ebola is thought to originate in fruit bats that bite primates." It is true that there are several lines of evidence to suggest that fruit bats may be the natural reservoir for Ebola virus:
Fruit bats play an important role in the ecosystem by pollinating native trees (and insectivorous bats, like the ones we have in the US, provide pest control). Misleading statements about bats can cause people to fear them unnecessarily and potentially lead to mass bat culls. I hope that you will amend your article in light of the information I have provided, and remove the phrase "that bite primates."
Sincerely,
Cecilia Sánchez
Ph.D. student
Odum School of Ecology
University of Georgia
http://ceciliaasanchez.weebly.com/
Dear Ms. Freyer,
Thank you for your recent article in the Globe about the Ebola response in the US. I am a PhD student at the University of Georgia studying emerging diseases in fruit bats, and have followed the Ebola outbreak with interest.
I had one comment to make regarding your statement that "Ebola is thought to originate in fruit bats that bite primates." It is true that there are several lines of evidence to suggest that fruit bats may be the natural reservoir for Ebola virus:
- Ebola virus has been shown to replicate in experimentally inoculated fruit bats (Swanepoel et al. 1996, Emerging Infectious Diseases 2:321-325)
- Antibodies against Ebola virus have been found in wild fruit bats (Leroy et al. 2005, Nature 438:575-576)
Fruit bats play an important role in the ecosystem by pollinating native trees (and insectivorous bats, like the ones we have in the US, provide pest control). Misleading statements about bats can cause people to fear them unnecessarily and potentially lead to mass bat culls. I hope that you will amend your article in light of the information I have provided, and remove the phrase "that bite primates."
Sincerely,
Cecilia Sánchez
Ph.D. student
Odum School of Ecology
University of Georgia
http://ceciliaasanchez.weebly.com/