Nipah outbreak | Connection between environment and epidemic in focus

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Residents fix a sign reading ‘Nipah containment zone’ on a barricade put up to block a road after authorities declared the area a containment zone in Ayanchery village in Kozhikode district on Wednesday. | Photo Credit: Reuters

The similarity of the localities from where the Nipah infection originated three times in Kozhikode district raises a few questions about the link between environment and the epidemic. Thick foliage, fruits, rivers, areca palms and proximity to forest are the common features of these locations, characteristics of the down hill regions of the Western Ghats.

Kallad in Maruthonkara panchayat, epicentre of the present outbreak, is only 10 km by road from Sooppikkada in Perambra where the virus struck in 2018. If not for the Janakikkadu eco-tourism sector in between, the two locations will just be three km away.

Volunteers block a road in view of the Nipah virus spread in an affected area, at Kuttiyadi in Kozhikode, Wednesday, | Photo Credit: PTI

Janakikkadu is rich in biodiversity with enough fruit that bats, identified as carriers of the virus, feed on. However, scientists have confirmed that viruses come out only when bats are scared or disturbed. This raises the question of what is disturbing the sanctuary of the bats in Janakikkadu; deforestation and climate change being the top suspects.

Editorial | Unified approach: On the Nipah outbreak in Kerala and a One Health approach

Bats also venture out into human habitations at night in search of food, especially fruit and areca nut. Kallad as well as Sooppikkada are rich in ‘bat food’. Pazhur, near Mavoor, where the disease was identified in 2021 too has a similar geography and flora. The victim’s father then had a farm on a river bank and there was a tree inhabited by bats on the other bank.

As Nipah makes an appearance thrice in five years in the same district there need to be a proper study about the reasons and if human intrusion into the environment, including deforestation, quarrying, and river enc