Critical View on the Importance of Host Defense Strategies on Virus Distribution of Bee Viruses: What Can We Learn from SARS-CoV-2 Variants?

Abstract

Bees, both wild and domesticated ones, are hosts to a plethora of viruses, with most of them infecting a wide range of bee species and genera. Although viral discovery and research on bee viruses date back over 50 years, the last decade is marked by a surge of new studies, new virus discoveries, and reports on viral transmission in and between bee species. This steep increase in research on bee viruses was mainly initiated by the global reports on honeybee colony losses and the worldwide wild bee decline, where viruses are regarded as one of the main drivers. While the knowledge gained on bee viruses has significantly progressed in a short amount of time, we believe that integration of host defense strategies and their effect on viral dynamics in the multi-host viral landscape are important aspects that are currently still missing. With the large epidemiological dataset generated over the last two years on the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic, the role of these defense mechanisms in shaping viral dynamics has become eminent. Integration of these dynamics in a multi-host system would not only greatly aid the understanding of viral dynamics as a driver of wild bee decline, but we believe bee pollinators and their viruses provide an ideal system to study the multi-host viruses and their epidemiology.

Breeding honey bees (Apis mellifera L.) for low and high Varroa destructor population growth: Gene expression of bees performing grooming behavior

“…This study found a positive correlation between time of first grooming and ABPV levels in HVG bees, suggesting a possible effect of the viral infection in the ability of the bees to perform self-grooming. In addition to the above, exploring viral dynamics taking into consideration effects of individual defense mechanisms should be explored, as proposed by Piot and Smagghe ( 70 ), but also the effects of behavioral immune responses as it could provide more information about the impact of viruses, vectored and not vectored by V. destructor (like BQCV and Apis rhabdovirus-2 ), on honey bee health. This results not only emphasize the possible impact of viral infections on behavioral immune responses, but also that breeding programs should use genomic assisted selection to avoid the interference of stressors in the performance evaluations, such as V. destructor parasitism and viral infections.…”