Man dies of brain-swelling bat virus after drinking juice as experts warn of ‘next pandemic threat’

A MAN has died of a brain-swelling Nipah virus after drinking raw juice, experts have warned.

The virus, which inspired the blockbuster film Contagion about a global pandemic, kills up to 75 per cent of those it infects.

AlamyNipah inspired the film Contagion about a global pandemic (pictured: Gwyneth Paltrow, who played patient 0)[/caption]

AFP or licensorsThe virus is transmitted from animals like fruit bats and pigs to humans[/caption]

The unnamed man, from Bangladesh, had drank raw date juice contaminated by the urine or saliva of infected fruit bats, health officials have said.

“The sample was sent for a laboratory test, and it turned positive. We came to know that the person drank raw date sap,” Tahmina Shirin, director of the health ministry’s Institute of Epidemiology, Disease Control and Research (IEDCR), told Reuters.

The health ministry has warned people against drinking raw date juice after at least 139 people contracted the virus after consuming the drink.

Nipah is a zoonotic virus transmitted from animals like fruit bats and pigs to humans.

It was first identified in Malaysia in 1999, but predominantly spreads in Bangladesh and parts of India. 

A total of 10 people among 14 infected with Nipah virus in Bangladesh died in 2023, the highest number of fatalities in seven years, according to the IEDCR.

Of those who survive it, around 20 per cent are left with long-term neurological conditions, including personality changes or seizure disorders. 

Next pandemic threat

Listed by the World Health Organisation (WHO) as a “priority pathogen” with pandemic potential, it can rapidly attack the respiratory and central nervous systems.

For comparison, estimates based on the Johns Hopkins University dashboard suggest the fatality rate of Covid is just over one per cent.

There is no medicine or vaccine available to treat Nipah. However, at least eight groups of experts are working on developing shots to mitigate the virus. 

Scientists previously told The Sun that Nipah could “absolutely be the cause of a new pandemic”.

The United States deems the virus a Category C bioterrorism threat, as it “could be engineered for mass dissemination in the future”. 

Professor Paul Hunter, from the University of East Anglia, said the most likely transmission is through food.

“If infected carcasses are exported internationally, that could cause a short-lived pandemic,” he told the Sun.