Epidemiology of henipaviruses

The natural reservoir of Hendra and Nipah virus are fruit bats of the genus Pteropus. In Queensland Australia several people were infected with Hendra virus after close contact with Hendra virus infected horses. In the large outbreak in Malaysia, where Nipah virus (NiV) was first identified, most human infections resulted from close contact with NiV infected pigs. Outbreak investigations in Bangladesh implicate drinking raw date palm sap as the most common pathway of NiV transmission from Pteropus bats to people, but person-to-person transmission of NiV has also been repeatedly identified in Bangladesh and India. While henipaviruses are not easily transmitted to people, since most people known to be infected with these viruses die, and some strains are already capable of limited person-to-person transmission, these RNA viruses warrant continued surveillance and scientific attention.