Singapore, Nov. 1 -- Virus spillover - the transmission of viruses from one species to another - may be occurring between bats and humans in Nagaland, India, according to a new collaborative study by the National Centre of Biological Sciences (NCBS) in India, Duke-NUS Medical School in Singapore, and the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences (USUHS) in the USA. The study published in the scientific journal PLOS Neglected Tropical Diseases reaffirms the importance of virus surveillance at wildlife and human interfaces where the risk of virus spillover (transmission) may be highest.

Infectious diseases spilling over from wildlife are not new - as of 2008, approximately 70 per cent of all known emerging diseases are thought t...