Here is a 5-point explainer from Dr Sameer Gupta, Senior Interventional Cardiologist in New Delhi:
The fatality has been reported at anywhere between 75 per cent and 100 per cent.
Nipah virus affects the brain. An infected person will have fever, weakness and lethargy.
Nipah virus infection is an example of a zoonotic disease, where animal diseases can be transmitted to people. In a zoonotic disease, the chances of a human being getting the disease will be lesser if the animal is given adequate antibiotics.
There have been cases of human-to-human transmission too. However, it is still being studied whether the transmission happened because everyone was exposed to the same infected person or if the same source passed on the infection to another person.
The Nipah virus has a tendency to adapt or mutate, like the H1N1 virus. If you get a swine flu or influenza vaccination this year, the effect of the vaccination may not be last through to the next year because the virus would have mutated by then. And that is why such viruses are very deadly. Some of the deadliest diseases in the world are viral-borne diseases.
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