The Terrifying Fungus That Could Destroy The World | Unveiled

<h4>

This Terrifying Fungus Could Destroy the World</h4>

The 2013 video game “The Last of Us” brought the cordyceps fungus into the public imagination, and it reached an even wider audience with the release of the 2023 HBO TV adaptation. In the series, this mutated fungus causes a zombie outbreak like you’ve never seen before, infecting anyone and everyone it can reach. But did you know this fungus is actually real, and it really is out there?

This is Unveiled, and today we’re answering the extraordinary question; could this terrifying fungus destroy the world?

“Cordyceps” is the name for hundreds of species of parasitic fungus, the majority (but not quite all) of which are found in the wild in the tropical jungles of Asia, predominantly in countries like China, Thailand, and Vietnam. Some are found a little further away from the MOST tropical areas, but they all need consistent heat and humidity to survive. 

Crucially, Cordyceps is described as an “entomopathogenic” fungus, which literally means it brings disease to insects. Through fungal spores cordyceps reproduces, spreading those spores through the air. Fortunately for us, the effects aren’t generally serious, more likely causing something on the level of an allergic reaction, just as plant pollen can during spring and summer. Cordyceps doesn’t trigger just allergies in the insects it infects, however. Its treatment of insects is something that’s more out of a horror movie – or a horror video game and its TV adaptation, in this case. The specific type used in the game and show is actually another, closely related type of fungus, called “Ophiocordyceps” - often nicknamed the “zombie-ant fungus”. 

This fungus really does create zombies out of the bugs it inhabits, commonly ants but it’s also known to affect other creatures like wasps or moths. Broadly, it invades and slowly replaces the tissue in its host’s brain, working something like a tumor, affecting the ant’s behavior and forcing it to do things that benefit the fungus. Specifically, the fungus ‘compels’ the ant to head to warmer, more humid areas. Once there, it guides the insect to bite down on a leaf, where it remains until it succumbs to the fungus fully. From here, the fungus is able to sprout through the ant’s exoskeleton, killing it in the process in an extremely grisly way. 

Once complete, those newly emerging heads of fungus can release spores again, and the cycle begins anew with other, surrounding insects becoming the next that are under threat. As such, entire insect colonies have been known to be destroyed by these fungi, although generally, cordyceps doesn’t WANT to eradicate every ant on Earth. If it did that, it would bring about its own extinction, too, as it would run out of hosts and food. Over time, then, it’s adapted, to ensure that insect populations do at least remain. It’s not like cordyceps is a virus that wants to multiply and spread endlessly; it’s a living creature with its own place in the environment, and it fully understands this. As unpleasant as parasitic organisms are, they all have their place in nature.

But could cordyceps ever really adapt to affect humans, in a similar way as it does in “The Last of Us”? Scientists generally say no, not really. In the show, the situation is slightly changed from how it appears in the game. It’s explained as the fungus being able to adapt because of global warming. The world’s temperatures have increased enough that cordyceps can mutate with reckless abandon, making the astonishing leap from insects to human beings. In the real world, however, this alone is difficult enough. We do sometimes see viruses and other microorganisms leap between species, but it’s still relatively rare, and again a fungus works very differently to a virus. Plus, while global warming affecting organisms like this is definitely an interesting idea, the fact is that cordyceps already thrives in some of Earth’s warmest places, the rainforests. So, if it were capable of making the leap to humans, it would have undoubtedly already done so hundreds, if not thousands, of years ago. In some cases, its home, in the tropical and subtropical regions of Asia, are also some of the oldest continually inhabited places on Earth. Modern humans have existed alongside cordyceps, then, for 5,000 years or more... and cordyceps has even long been used as an ingredient in traditional Chinese medicine. Humans have already lived among the fungus and its spores for centuries, consuming it without suffering any majorly ill effects - and without triggering a global health crisis.

As to why this is, it’s thought that cordyceps wouldn’t be able to survive inside the human body. The ambient temperatures in even the warmest tropical forests don’t compare to inside ourselves. Meanwhile, the insects that do host it are cold-blooded, which means that, unlike with us, their body heat remains the same as the rainforest that’s around them - making them an ideal base for the fungus. Ants and other insects are also very simple organisms for cordyceps to take over. An ant’s brain holds roughly 250,000 neurons, which maybe sounds like a lot, until you consider that the human brain contains 86 billion neurons. That makes a human brain 344,000 times more complex than an ant’s. For myriad reasons, humans and ants just aren’t comparable, and so the plausibility of a fungus jumping STRAIGHT from an ant to a human without adapting to any other, smaller mammals along the way is, essentially, absurd. In the very worst case scenario, if it did swiftly move through the food chain, we might hope (even expect) to contain it long before it reached us.

In the here and now, scientists are keen to stress that the zombie-ant fungus might actually have benefits (not risks) for humankind. Not only is cordyceps regularly consumed as a general health supplement, but there are potential links to it reducing cholesterol, with some early studies suggesting that it could be useful in combating heart disease. More specifically, Ophiocordyceps, is of particular interest, too, not because it could someday evolve and wipe us all out… but because it might be able to produce very useful antibacterial agents. It does this in itself to protect the fungal organism, but some scientists believe that there’s a chance to convert it for human use, and even the potential for it being used to treat cancer. So, in reality, this outwardly terrifying fungus might actually one day prove a life saver.

If it ever did become dangerous, we already have a lot of options to treat fungal infections, as well. Antifungal medicines can be applied to the skin or taken orally, and they’re very effective against many infections that humans really ARE susceptible to – like athlete’s foot, for example. Other antifungal treatments can target all kinds of other conditions. So, the general idea that a deadly fungus could evolve and human medicine would be at a complete loss to deal with it… is also far-fetched.

All of this isn’t to say that some fungi haven’t already proven themselves to be dangerous to humans – even if none, so far, have turned us into zombies. Ergot is a fungus that grows on rye. If consumed by us, it can be extremely dangerous… causing a condition known as “ergotism”, which can trigger seizures, muscle spasms, nausea, gangrene, and potentially even death. Shockingly, some research has identified ergot as possibly being behind a different kind of outbreak, too: mass hysteria. Specifically, the mass hysteria of the Salem witch trials. It’s important to note that many dispute this research, but it’s still been postulated that the symptoms of people being “bewitched” during the trials in the 1690s, may have actually been the symptoms of ergot poisoning via people eating contaminated bread. You still can’t spread ergotism person to person, like a zombie virus… but it goes to show that some fungi really are a threat. 

So, what’s your verdict? Do YOU think cordyceps is something we need to be more worried about? 

Ultimately, while frightening, it affects tiny insects that are so fundamentally different from humans that many believe we’re safe, for now. That’s why this terrifying fungus probably COULDN’T destroy the world, despite what games and TV shows say. But, nevertheless, this is still nature at its most ruthless and bizarre.