• Question: Do you know any single-celled viruses or illnesses?

    Asked by anon-193425 to Jamal, iainstaniland, Heidi, Emma, Carl on 14 Nov 2018.
    • Photo: Emma Crawford

      Emma Crawford answered on 14 Nov 2018:


      Not off the top of my head! I had a quick look online, and apparently viruses are intracellular organisms, meaning that they infiltrate the host cell and live inside the cell. Viruses change the host cell’s genetic material from its normal function to producing the virus itself.

    • Photo: Iain Staniland

      Iain Staniland answered on 14 Nov 2018:


      Not personally no……..most of my friends are multi-cellular 😉

      But to be serious a lot of our illnesses are caused by viruses called pathogenic viruses

      there is a good explanation of how they work here:
      https://www.news-medical.net/health/What-is-a-Virus.aspx

      A guess the most obvious viral disease is the common cold or flu!

    • Photo: Heidi Gardner

      Heidi Gardner answered on 16 Nov 2018:


      Good question! Viruses actually rely on other cells to ‘host’ them – they piggyback on to other cells and use their machinery and parts to help them to infect new cells. Bacteria can be single-celled, but once that bacteria causes an illness it’s likely that there are thousands of bacteria within the body of the person that’s sick. Being able to replicate is one of the main characteristics of bacteria, so large groups of those cells are what cause illnesses.

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