Infected bees were less likely to be fed by other bees, a common behavior shown here. By Erik StokstadSocial distancing is nothing new to honey bees.
When a colony is infected with the deadly Israeli acute paralysis virus (IAPV), bees are less likely to touch or feed their sick nest mates, according to a new study.
But the virus appears to have an alarming counterattack: When sick bees try to enter a new colony, they do a better job of getting past the guards than uninfected bees.
That has led the scientists to speculate that the virus has evolved a way to spread to new hives. The study opens an important window into a “coevolutionary arms race” between pathogens and social organisms, says Olav Rueppell, an evolutionary biologist at the