• Question: Do you think theoretically that there will be a point, where a ‘Super’ Virus affects the ‘Micro world’ where diseases could be wiped out, if yes will this be a bad thing or will the absence of ‘good’ micro-organisms affect us in more of a negative way than the absence of ‘bad’ micro-organisms will affect us?

    Asked by pratyushjain to Lyn, Katy, Paul, PB, Ruth on 21 Jun 2013.
    • Photo: Peter Balfe

      Peter Balfe answered on 21 Jun 2013:

      Very unlikely, the microbes have been fighting it out to survive since long before the emergence of multicellular life. I think we can be pretty sure they’ve tried every trick in the book.
      If we did lose all these micro-organisms we’d be dead quite soon after. We totally rely on them (google for vitamin K2). 99.99999% of the micro-organisms you harbour (I just made that number up), are either harmless or actively beneficial. Remember for every cell in you body which is “you” i.e. carries human DNA, there are 10 bacteria. You need never feel lonely again!

    • Photo: Katy Brown

      Katy Brown answered on 24 Jun 2013:

      I think every time a disease-causing agent is wiped out, there will always be something else to jump into its place. It’s not at all likely that a single virus could wipe out all diseases because they are not closely related to each other – bacteria and viruses are very different and viruses don’t even have cells! Parasites are very different again. If something wiped out all three of these it would probably wipe us out too.

    • Photo: Paul Waines

      Paul Waines answered on 25 Jun 2013:

      @pratyushjain- wow, what an idea.

      I don’t think that this would actually happen. In nature, viruses and bacteria are in a constant race in order to adapt and stay ahead of eachother in order to survive. As a result, there is an amazing variety out there, and to design a supervirus which could wipe everything out would take so long, that many bacteria and viruses would have mutated anyway and would be unaffected.

      If it did happen, we would not last long either- there are more bacterial cells in and on our body than human cells, and without them we couldn’t survive. In a way we are more bacterial than human! We also use bacteria and other microorganisms in many different ways, from cleaning our water to brewing beer, and we’d lose all that too.

      Plus I’d have nothing to study…

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