Camels May Transmit New Middle Eastern Virus 163
sciencehabit writes "Ever since people in the Middle East started dying of a mysterious new infection last year, scientists have been trying to pinpoint the source of the outbreak. Now they may finally have found a clue in an unlikely population: retired racing camels. Countries like Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates produce and consume large amounts of camel meat. The authors of the paper point out that huge numbers of camels are imported to the Middle East from African countries as well as from Australia, where the animals were introduced in the 19th century and which now has an estimated 1 million feral camels. (Australia started exporting camels to Saudi Arabia for meat production in 2002.) That raises the possibility that African or Australian bats harbor the virus and camels carried it to the Middle East."
Re:My First Thought... (Score:5, Funny)
I was on the third sentence in the summary before my brain caught up with what I read in the first sentence and I stopped picturing some kind of sneaker-net of racing camels, carrying infected USBs between nomads' camp-site computers.
Nice "retirement" plan (Score:5, Funny)
I guess this is what you call "a camelwoe".
The cure is very simple (Score:0, Funny)
Stop fucking them camels!
Re:MERS Worldwide apocalypse (Score:2, Funny)
"WE'RE NOT TAKING ANY FUCKING CHANCES."
~ The President of Madagascar, earlier today.
Re:My First Thought... (Score:4, Funny)
Yeah, but he tastes a bit stringy