Two infected people have died since August 30 in Kerala’s fourth outbreak of the virus since 2018, forcing authorities to declare containment zones in at least eight Kozhikode village.
- Nipah is a zoonotic virus, which means it is transmitted from animals to human beings.
- The transmission happens mainly through consumption of contaminated food.
- Human-to-human transmission is also considered possible.
- The animal host reservoir for this virus is known to be the fruit bat, commonly known as flying fox.
- Fruit bats are known to transmit this virus to other animals like pigs, and also dogs, cats, goats, horses and sheep.
- The first outbreaks of the Nipah virus among humans was reported from Malaysia (1998) and Singapore (1999).
- The virus takes its name from the village in Malaysia where the person in whom the virus was first isolated died of the disease.
- Humans get infected mainly through direct contact with these animals, or through consumption of food contaminated by saliva or urine of these infected animals.
