New virus may be killing bees

New virus may be killing bees

news.yahoo.com

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - A newly discovered virus may be killing bees or may be making some bees vulnerable enough to disappear, U.S. researchers reported on Thursday.

While the virus probably does not alone account for what scientists call colony collapse disorder, or CCD, it could help explain what is happening to bees across the United States, they said.

(visit the link for the full news article)

The virus first idetified in Isreal called Israeli acute paralysis virus (IAPV) in 2004 and is may be one of the reasons for the sudden decline in the bee population. Bee populations seem to carry a huge viral load, but IAPV is the common denominator when colonies collapse. If the trend continues, the worlds food supply could be put in danger.

news.yahoo.com
(visit the link for the full news article)

what exactly is happening to bees in america ?

does this so called "virus" have anything to do with the countless cell phone towers being placed every few miles?

This is quite interesting because I told my wife about 3 months ago that I wouldn't be surprised if they found a viral culprit. Seeing as how some colonies have been decimated it fits the pattern for mass viral infections in their population. IAPV has not yet been classified according to its Genus, so I am unfamiliar with most of the current research concerning this particular virus. However, the virus has been classified as belonging to the family of Dicistroviridae, which does help in trying to understand how the virus can destroy a good percentage of the bees. Dicistroviridae are positive sense single stranded RNA (ssRNA) based viruses that are generally quite similar to one another in the sense that they all have a non-enveloped capsid with icosahedral symmetry and 3 structural proteins on the capsid (compared to the 5 found on most insect viruses).

This family of viruses are so new I'll be honest when I say I know little about them and how they are transmitted. Nevertheless, because they are RNA based it does lend some credence to their ability to kill off populations of insects. RNA based viruses usually replicate much faster than their DNA based counterparts, and this could account for why so many bees have apparently died off. I'm going to do a little more research and find out what I can about this virus and it's capability to infect mass populations...should be quite interesting.

When you think about the deeper ramifications of this bee die-off, what better way to take out a people through non-military means than by taking away their food supply? I read on another site that this Israeli virus is a bio-weapon and that our gov't has known about this since 2002.