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New Virus Jumps From Monkeys To Lab Workers
sciencehabit writes "It started with a single monkey coming down with pneumonia at the California National Primate Research Center in Davis. Within weeks, 19 monkeys were dead and three humans were sick. Now, a new report confirms that the Davis outbreak was the first known case of an adenovirus jumping from monkeys to humans. The upside: the virus may one day be harnessed as a tool for gene therapy."
Why would it "wipe out the bulk of the human race"? We encounter new viruses every year and our immune systems adapt. The workers in question didn't die either. How do you make the leap from a simple virus in an ape jumping to a few isolated humans to it wiping out the human race? Been watching too many movies? How would this be different than say, avian or swine flu? Somehow because it comes from an ape suddenly we're all doomed? Grow up.