Viral sharing in bats and rodents: Viruses may pass more easily between sympatric bat species than sympatric rodent species

Background/Question/Methods

Bats (Order Chiroptera) are now known to be the natural reservoirs of a number of high impact zoonotic viruses, such as SARS coronavirus, Ebola and Marburg filoviruses, Hendra virus, Nipah virus and Menangle virus. There has been consequent speculation that bats may be unique in their potential to harbor zoonotic viruses, yet there are no published quantitative comparative analyses to support these claims. Here, we compare bats (Order Chiroptera) and rodents (Order Rodentia) as reservoirs of zoonotic viruses. Using generalized linear models (GLM) and generalized least squares (GLS), we examine correlates of the number of zoonotic viruses hosted by a species. Further, we use network analyses to examine viral sharing among bats and among rodents.

Results/Conclusions

Bats were found to host a greater number of zoonotic viruses per species than rodents. Sympatry was the best predictor of viral richness. In other words, species whose ranges overlapped with a greater number of other species in the same taxonomic order hosted more viruses, but this relationship was four times stronger in bats than in rodents. Network analyses reveal that there is more viral sharing in bats than in rodents, and we present host and virus traits correlated to viral sharing. These results suggest that viruses may pass more easily between sympatric bat species than sympatric rodent species.