Forget about Stuart Little or that rat chef in Ratatouille for a minute. In reality, these tiny furry creatures that can be found almost everywhere can be just as deadly as other types of animals that are already known sources of often-fatal diseases such as Ebola.
A team of researchers from Columbia University was one of those who also traveled in remote places around the globe searching for animals that may carry potentially lethal viruses. However, for their new study, they didn't have to pack their bags and travel far. They simply went to New York City.
One of the most vibrant cities in the world, New York is actually home to thousands of rats that linger underneath the subways and in the sewage, to name a few. They are so common that people no longer paid much attention to them-unless they learn of the findings of these researchers.
For the study, they captured over 130 rats in various locations in the city, dissected them, and looked into their excretions such as saliva and feces, as well as tissues, for pathogens.
They weren't disappointed. While these rats have viruses that can cause food poisoning such as E. coli and Salmonella, what astonished them is the fact that these NY City rats also have more than 15 different types of viruses that are not yet known to man simply because they haven't been infected with them, including two novel viruses that work similarly as human hepatitis C.
According to W. Ian Lipkin, the senior author of the study that has already been published in mBio, these rats can be considered as "sentinels" as far as human diseases are concerned because they can travel basically everywhere, picking up viruses along the way. They also roam around highly populated areas, which means the chances of passing these viruses to humans are high.
What the study suggests then is for cities to continuously monitor the growth of rat population and gain better understanding of the relationship between microbes found in these animals and transmission to humans.