When animals go viral, they’re trying to tell us something vital

An invisible, but not unforeseen, virus has brought the world to its knees.

We have been staggered. We’re not defeated, but it feels like we’re in an existential fight for our way of life. Our hopes for the future are pinned on the development of a vaccine and reliable testing.

But while we are focused on a vaccine, the scope and scale of this pandemic suggest an important lesson for us.

Animals are at the heart of this disease. It is a “zoonotic disease,” which means it begins in animals and jumps the species barrier to humans.

If we genuinely want to prevent future outbreaks like this one, we need to consider whether the animals are trying to tell us something.

One of the central revelations of COVID-19 surely must be that there is something unhealthy in our relationship with animals—particularly with animals we intend to eat. We are being made sick by animals that we have made sick.

The World Health Organization has identified illegally trafficked pangolins as the likely cause of the current pandemic. Pangolins, a strange mammal with scales like a dragon, are eaten as a delicacy in some parts of Asia.

Bats also may be involved. Bats are also eaten in many places (100,000 per year in Ghana). Both pangolins and bats carry the virus that can mutate into a strain of the novel coronavirus.

Both these animals are sold in marketplaces known for squalor and cruelty. Animals are slaughtered on the spot. Cages are small, overcrowding is common. Blood and feces can transfer the virus.

In other words, there is a perfect reservoir for the development of new strains of deadly viruses.

Lately President Trump has blamed a Chinese lab. The exact origin and pathways of this virus are not yet clear. What is clear, however, is that, as one epidemiologist at Georgetown University said, 70% of these outbreaks are caused by wildlife.

Viral outbreaks like COVID-19 are not new. In fact, they are becoming a regular and recurring part of modern life.

Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome emerged in a deadly outbreak in 2003. The likely source was a palm civet, another animal most of us have never heard of. Bats are also suspected.

Ebola was a scourge in West Africa between 2013-2016, and again in 2018. That virus came from non-human primates — chimpanzees, gorillas and monkeys — all part of the bush meat trade. Again, bats are also suspected.

This is not about “Third World diseases.” Nor is it about the strange eating habits of “other” cultures. These viruses do not discriminate like that. In the United States we have our own domestic history of viral outbreaks; ours are associated with industrial agriculture.

Swine flu and avian flu both have had numerous outbreaks in the U.S. A famous and devastating outbreak in the Upper Midwest resulted in the “euthanizing” of 50 million chickens and turkeys. In 2018, South Carolina had an outbreak. China has had several as well.

Now we learn that COVID-19 is having what one economist calls a “rampant outbreak” in meat-packing plants throughout the U.S.. This is no surprise. A long list of books examines the unhealthy conditions for workers and animals in these places.

The language of industrial agriculture depends on terms like “meat-packing plant,” or “euthanasia,” which are euphemisms to deflect attention from what’s going on there.

Is there a nexus between animal cruelty and human disease, especially in our food supply? Is there something unhealthy — literally and morally — in crucial parts of our relationship with animals?

These are uncomfortable questions, but they need to be part of the global conversation about this pandemic.

Otherwise, we are “sitting ducks,” as it were. We may get our vaccine for COVID-19, but we will remain in an ongoing cycle of viral outbreaks.

We will remain vulnerable to the next inevitable (and even more deadly?) virus to jump the barrier between animals and humans.

Charles Bergman of Steilacoom is a professor of English at Pacific Lutheran University in Parkland. He’s the author of “Every Penguin in the World: A Quest to See Them All,” released this spring by Sasquatch Books.

This story was originally published May 8, 2020 at 12:00 PM.