Hayes Luk

Glad to be involved in this project published in @NatureComms that my senior Rachel, @KennethSMLi, our postdoc Longchao, @AntonioCPWong1 had been working for some years! Still remember the moment of witnessing successful isolation of bat #coronavirus HKU4 thanks @sci_questions

More unsettling news: 2 health care workers with uncertain exposure histories confirmed as #Ebola cases in Uganda. If they didn’t care for known cases, they were infected by undetected cases. That said, Uganda has been very effective in battling Ebola in the past.

I have spent my entire life working on this and thinking about this for the past 4 years. I don't know what will happen in 20 years, but I can promise you that on the 5-10 year timescale, scientists are not out of their jobs. AI is going to massively accelerate the pace of science, increase productivity, let individual scientists make way more discoveries way faster, and is going to make science overall more fun. But the model is going to be collaboration between humans and AI, not replacement. The key difference here between science and e.g. software engineering is that science is not verifiable in any rapid/convenient way (unlike software), unlike programming. We still need humans for their scientific taste.

The early trajectory of the Ebola outbreak in DRC is alarming. Spread of the disease likely went undetected for months. Fast detection and response are crucial to stop outbreaks.

Initial genomes from the May 2026 Bundibugyo virus disease outbreak in DRC & Uganda are now available. Sequencing by INRB in DRC and CPHL in Uganda shows the current outbreak genomes form a distinct cluster from previous BDBV outbreaks in Uganda 2007 & DRC 2012, supporting a new spillover event. This is a strong example of rapid cross-border genomic surveillance informing epidemic preparedness & response (virological.org/t/initial-geno…).

While DRC has experience of managing Ebola outbreaks, rapid diagnostics (for the Zaire strain) failed to identify this was Ebola for weeks. This circulating strain of Ebola is the Bundibugyo virus: we have no approved drugs, vaccines or rapid diagnostics for this strain. Response will be tracing contacts, isolating patients, protecting healthcare workers with PPE & stopping transmission (usually through bodily fluids). Much harder bc this is an area with conflict & instability. Good decision by the Director-General to issue a PHEIC (emergency declaration) immediately.

Highlights from Disease Outbreak News on #Ebola disease caused by Bundibugyo Virus Disease, Democratic Republic of the Congo & Uganda - 16 May 2026: 🔴 As of 15 May, a total of 246 suspected cases and 80 deaths (4 deaths among confirmed cases) have been reported. 65 contacts have been listed, with 15 identified as high-risk. 🔴 Most of the suspected cases are between 20 and 39 years old, with females accounting for over 60%, suggesting significant risks associated with household and caregiver transmission. 🔴 Insecurity in the affected areas and movement restrictions are hampering the surveillance and follow up efforts. Several listed contacts became symptomatic and died before they could be isolated. 🔴 Ituri province’s role in #DRC as a commercial and migratory hub and proximity to #Uganda and South Sudan increases the risk of regional exportation and cross-border transmission. Read the full Disease Outbreak News here: bit.ly/43cOnM2

A classic: colleagues on DRC mentioned that the ebola outbreak was not detected by the genexpert. As this is a bundibugyovirus, that indeed is the case. It shows how important is is to have local detection capacity

@HelenBranswell is right to call this out. A confirmed #Ebola case in Kinshasa potentially changes the risk picture because it suggests the virus may have moved from a remote outbreak zone into one of the largest, most connected cities in Africa. Two reportedly unlinked confirmed cases in Kampala are also very concerning. The critical question now is whether these are isolated imported cases or evidence of local transmission in major urban centers. Those are very different scenarios. This does not mean containment has failed. But the window for getting ahead of this gets much narrower if there is any unrecognized urban transmission. Speed, diagnostics, contact tracing, and coordination matter even more now.

1. #WHO has declared the #Ebola #Bundibugyo outbreak in NE DRC a public health emergency of international concern, aka a PHEIC. Yet another sign this is likely to be a very challenging outbreak. So far there've been 8 confirmed cases, 246 suspected cases & 80 suspected deaths.

Take a look at our recent work on the seasonal coronavirus HKU1. We developed the first cell line–based system to propagate the virus and explore its biology. HKU1 grows much better at 33°C, the temperature of the nasal cavity, than at 37°C lnkd.in/exNCVxyd

Version 7. Best effort made to assign a case number for 9-11 (10 described as an inconclusive positive due to POS/NEG test results). Until an authority like @WHO defines the order, I'm charting my own path.

For the fourth time (ever?) Hong Kong's restaurant receipts from non-Chinese restaurants exceeded receipts from Chinese restaurants in a single quarter. • In 1Q 2026, non-Chinese restaurants generated more than HK$10 billion in receipts in a quarter for the first time ever

@MarionKoopmans @MackayIM x.com/MackayIM/statu…

@MackayIM @hayesluk Great!!

Okay. This is today's version 2. Hopefully, the typos are corrected and additions made. I greatly appreciate the feedback - I put it out in a rush. Sorry about that. I moved some text to a sidebar to allow a little breathing room.

Version 4. Spanish case added. Latest version pinned to the top of my timeline.

some updates and small corrections on the hantavirus phylogeny below: virological.org/t/complete-seq… the cruise ship virus is from ANDV Clade 3 (see Fig2A doi.org/10.1128/mspher…) Clade 3 has confirmed human cases, Clade 2 has confirmed H2H, safe to assume both can H2H #ANDV

Lin Heung Lau, a historic Hong Kong teahouse dating to the 1920s, hosted a 'dim sum rave' to attract Gen-Z diners, where around 300 partygoers danced under a disco ball while eating shrimp dumplings and siu mai as a DJ played electronic and Cantonese music

BREAKING: First sequencing of the Hantavirus from the outbreak. -99% identical to a June 2018 case from a patient in Argentina -10.4 SNV/year mutation rate - The Andes genome is about 12 kb across three RNA segments. At 10⁻⁴ to 10⁻³ substitutions/site/year, that translates very roughly to 1-12 SNV per year -Completely in line with a natural spillover in Argentina from the rodent host in 2018 and now in 2026 Source: virological.org/t/complete-seq…

2/ Importantly, transmission is not limited to close contacts or prolonged exposures, as demonstrated in a 2020 study of the 2018 Argentina outbreak, and airborne precautions should be implemented. nejm.org/doi/full/10.10…

A Chilean study from ~20 years ago found that 3.4% of household contacts exposed to Andes virus (hantavirus) became infected, with the highest risk among sexual partners. Viral RNA was detectable in blood 5-15 days before symptom onset. tinyurl.com/337h9jxf by Ferres et al.