“If we had a delta type of Nipah virus, we would suddenly have a highly transmissible virus with a 50 per cent mortality rate,” Dame Sarah Gilbert said during an event at the Cheltenham Festival of Literature in the United Kingdom on Thursday.

So, what is the Nipah virus and should we be worried?

The Nipah virus is not new and has been lurking for years. In 1,999 the virus arrived in central Malaysia after it found a host in bats, who then stopped over to eat from fruit trees that hung over pig farms.