UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, SAN DIEGO

 

 

BERKELEY « DAVIS * IRVINE * LOS ANGELES ¢ RIVERSIDE * SAN DIEGO * SAN FRANCISCO SANTA BARBARA * SANTA CRUZ

 

 

 

DEPARTMENT OF BIOLOGY, C-016 LA JOLLA, CALIFORNIA 92093

July 28, 1988

  

Dr. Joshua Lederberg, President
The Rockefeller University
New York, NY 10021

Dear Dr. Lederberg:

Thank you for your note regarding the appearance of "new" virus diseases of
humans and the reprint of your January 20 lecture in Paris. I share your con-
cerns regarding the possibility of emerging virus pandemics. It is not a
question of "whether?" there will be new virus scourges challenging the
expanding human population, but "when?", "what kinds of viruses?", and "how
rapid and how serious the spread?". Rapid virus evolution is so dominated
by stochastic events that predictability cannot even be hoped-for. Although
I have studied persistent virus infections for decades, I was frankly sur-
prised that the most recent challenge has come from the slowly-replicating,
chronic, close-contact infections by AIDS viruses. I had expected (and still
expect) that we are more vulnerable to newly-arisen acute RNA virus diseases
with very short incubation periods; rapid, high-level virus replication; and
high transmissibility by the respiratory route.

I have not written much on this perplexing topic (I enclose reprints of the
Annual Reviews paper and an earlier review in Science). Esteban Domingo and

I have an extensive review of RNA virus variability in Volume III ("Variability
of RNA Genomes") of RNA GENETICS, C.R.C. Press, Boca Raton. This volume (/798)
contains a number of reviews regarding rapid evolution of RNA viruses. The
final article, "Sequence Space and Quasispecies Distribution" by Manfred Eigen
and Christof Biebricher, provides an intriguing, quantitative, theoretical treat-
ment of RNA virus evolution, fitness topography, mutation frequencies, and error
thresholds, population structures, etc.

I have not thought much about possible surveillance and rapid response mechanisms.
One virologist who has (at least with regard to arthropod-borne viruses) is Bob
Shope at Yale. The U.S. Army Medical Research and Development Command maintains
a strong interest in this problem, but I don't know what mechanisms they have

at hand for surveillance.

With best wishes,
Sincerely,
a L
QD pobe He 00a
9 John Holland aa

/dd
Enclosures