59. From The World’s Oldest Virus to The Newest Pandemic Variant w/ Erin Bromage, Bill Hanage, David Sanders & Sarah Otto

In this episode I set off on a quest to find the oldest endemic human virus–the one that’s been riding along with our species the longest.  The answer is harder to get than I’d anticipated, but along the way I learn about some ancient viruses, and how viruses shape our evolution as they evolve themselves. 

I’ll also discuss where the omicron variant came from – including the possibility it jumped to another animal and back to humans. And I’ll get up to date on the latest worrisome variant – a sister of omicron called BA.2

Erin Bromage is a biologist and infectious disease expert at the UMass, Dartmouth

Bill Hanage is an epidemiologist at the Harvard School of Public Health

David Sanders is a virologist at Purdue University 

Sarah Otto is an evolutionary biologist at the University of British Columbia

“Follow the Science" is produced, written, and hosted by Faye Flam. Today’s episode was edited by Seth Gliksman with music by Kyle Imperatore. If you’d like to hear more "Follow the Science," please like, follow, and subscribe!