Influenza Virus: The Last Great Plague

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The influenza virus is, to date, one of the major causes of sickness around the world. It brings about a disease, which is one of the most infectious in the world today, and when combined with pneumonia, is one of the leading causes of death within the United States. It was first seen in 1918 during the Spanish influenza, which wiped out more than 20 million people and since then, scientists have attempted to get this virus under control but their efforts have thus been proved unsuccessful. Not only does the virus affect humans but it also goes on to affect dogs, birds, horses and even pigs. So what essentially makes this virus so hard to get under control and eventually eradicate? The main factor that stands out in all research conducted is the virus’ ability to evolve.
The family of influenza viruses is constantly changing with varying genetic changes and mutations, which leaves the body having to put up defenses against a “new” disease once again. These changes aren’t rapid ones. They happen slowly over time and thus the body isn’t able to recognize it. Therefore the questions posed by scientists are: How many types of …show more content…
An Unfinished Story of Discovery, reviewed by Sue Bottigheimer in The Quarterly Review in Biology, there are three types of influenza viruses that stem from the orthomyxoviridae family: Influenzavirus A, B and C. Human influenza A and B are the two that cause seasonal epidemics while Influenza type C only causes mild respiratory illnesses that are, to date, not known to cause epidemics. On the surface level, there only seems to be three types but Influenza A can be broken down into subtypes that are based on the proteins that are located on the surface namely, the hemaglutinin (H) and the neuraminidase (N). With respect to Influenza Virus B, while it may not be broken down into subtypes, it does have lineages and strains are the two current ones that are circulating are B/Yamagata and
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