Yama Virus
| Yama virus | |
| Virus classification | |
| (unranked): | Virus |
| Realm: | Riboviria |
| Phylum: | Negarnaviricota |
| Class: | Monjiviricetes |
| Order: | Mononegavirales |
| Family: | Filoviridae |
| Genus: | Yamavirus |
| Species: | Louzaria yamavirus |
| Virus: | Yama virus |
The Yama Virus, also known as Myocardium Digestorium Disease (MDD) or simply Yama, is a viral myocardium virus of humans and other primates and is also one of the only known viruses within the family Filoviridae.
The Yama Virus was first named and recorded by Osvald Jackson in February 2017 and was named from where it was discovered, near Mount Yama in Louzaria.
Because of its high mortality rate (up to 80-95%), Yama is also listed as a select agent, World Health Organization Risk Group 4 Pathogen (requiring Biosafety Level 4-equivalent containment), a MBE National Institutes of Health/National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Category A Priority Pathogen, MBE CDC Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Category A Bioterrorism Agent, and listed as a Biological Agent for Export Control by the Gordic Council.
Symptoms and properties
Yama spreads through human-to-human transmission via direct contact (through broken skin or mucous membranes) with the blood, secretions, organs or other bodily fluids of infected people, and with surfaces and materials (e.g. bedding, clothing) contaminated with these fluids. The virus can kill as early as 30 hours and as late as 50 hours after infecting the host. The Yama Virus infects its host through the blood, where, once in the bloodstream, the virions migrate to the heart where it will stay for the remainder of its life. Digestive enzymes within the virus quickly begin to break down the cell walls of the heart until the heart doesn't have the strength to continue pumping blood around the body.
A person infected with Yama Virus will experience little to no symptoms until the ' point of no return ', which is generally agreed when a person has been infected for more than 18 hours and no less than 22. It is at this point the person shall experience slight heart pains and in almost all cases internal bleeding concentrated within the torso. Heart pains will intensify after this period. Some cases reported bleeding from the nose and mouth after the point of no return. Infected persons may suffer headaches that can very from mild to extreme.
Between 30 and 50 hours the host enters the final stage where they die. The host will most likely suffer a heart aneurysm which becomes the precursor for several symptoms. Sudden, intense and persistent chest or back pain, pain that radiates to your back, trouble breathing, low blood pressure, loss of consciousness, shortness of breath, trouble swallowing, paralysis and death. The less common way the host dies is with substantial loss of blood which itself causes most of the aforementioned symptoms.
Studies
A 2018 study found that the virus could survive in dried blood for up to five days, and in liquid blood (outside the body) for as long as 14 days. In the laboratory, the virus displays some capability of infection through small-particle aerosols; however, airborne spread among humans has not been clearly demonstrated. Individuals handling the infected monkeys or their fluids and cell cultures of Yama virus have become ill.
The virus has a mortality rate anywhere between 80-95%. It is hard to estimate a mortality rate with only a handful of cases.