Norway’s Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations (CEPI), has teamed up with Malaysia’s Universiti Malaya (UM), Malaysia, to further research and gain a wider scientific understanding of the Nipah virus, media Biospectrum Asia writes.
The Nipah virus (NiV) is zoonotic, meaning that it can spread between animals and people. Fruit bats also called flying foxes, are the animal reservoir for NiV in nature and Biospectrum Asia writes that the Nipah virus is one of the deadliest pathogens known to infect humans.
To explore the Nipah virus more and to characterize and better understand immune responses generated against the virus, UM will work to collect biological material from Nipah survivors. To carry out the research, UM will collaborate with physicians and healthcare workers who responded to the first-ever documented Nipah virus outbreak in Malaysia in 1998/1999.
Under the new partnership, CEPI will be providing funding of $188.000 towards UM’s work and because Nipah outbreaks often are sporadic with few survivors, the work is set to provide critical new information on Nipah immunology that has not previously been studied.
