Could 'Arctic zombie viruses' inflict deadly new pandemic on humanity?

It sounds like a plot from a horror movie. An ancient virus trapped in layers of Arctic permafrost for tens of thousands of years remerges amid climate-induced thawing and inflicts a deadly new pandemic on humanity. 

But scientists believe it could become a terrifying reality as temperatures continue to rise and the ice reveals Earth's infectious past. Researchers have already found and isolated strains of Methuselah microbes – or zombie viruses as they are also known - in Siberia in 2014.

Scientists in France extracted the 30,000-year-old microbes from 100 feet deep in the snow and say the virus became infectious again after it had thawed. While it posed no threat to humans or animals, they warned that other viruses hidden deep in the frost could do. 

In response, an Arctic monitoring network has been created to monitor, respond to and isolate any ancient viruses that emerge from the frost to prevent them spreading across the human population and causing mass deaths.

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The frost's hidden dangers

Approximately a fifth of the northern hemisphere is covered in permafrost. Much of it is made up of soil that has remained at sub zero temperatures for hundreds of thousands of years.

Marion Koopmans is the Professor of Public Health Virology and Head of the Erasmus MC Department of Viroscience in Rotterdam. She says sub-zero temperatures are the perfect environment for viruses to hibernate. 

"Freezing is a good way of storing viruses," she told CGTN. "We store our virus collections at -80 degrees. What is not good to keep the viruses infectious is repeated cycles of freezing and thawing. 

"That is what may happen with permafrost once conditions change, so I am not sure how likely it is that viruses stay infectious during this natural process. But that may be different when there is a more abrupt process, for instance when a sheet of ice breaks off and melts."

Disturbing deadly viruses

The Earth's climate is changing rapidly as global warming contributes to rising temperatures across every continent. The Arctic is no different. In fact, temperatures there are rising three times faster than anywhere else on the planet.

As temperatures rise and ice melts, countries and businesses are seizing opportunities to use new shipping lanes in waters that were once occupied by ice and mining operations. But in doing so, they could be walking or sailing straight into a terrifying contagion.

Jean-Michel Claverie of Aix-Marseille University told The Guardian: "Huge mining operations are being planned, and are going to drive vast holes into the deep permafrost to extract oil and ores. Those operations will release vast amounts of pathogens that still thrive there. Miners will walk in and breath the viruses. The effects could be calamitous."

Koopman says the past can help to predict the future. She told CGTN: "If you look at the history of epidemic outbreaks, one of the key drivers has been change in land use. Nipah virus was spread by fruit bats who were driven from their habitats by humans. 

"Similarly, monkeypox has been linked to the spread of urbanization in Africa. And that is what we are about to witness in the Arctic: a complete change in land use, and that could be dangerous, as we have seen elsewhere."

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