Lifeboat Foundation

I wondered when this would happen. Reminds me of the video game “The Last of Us” and there’s a TV series as well. I’m sure they’ll stop it though.

Silver leaf disease is a curse for a variety of botanicals, from pears to roses to rhododendron. Infecting their leaves and branches, the fungus Chondrostereum purpureum can be fatal for the plant if not quickly treated.

Aside from the risk of losing the occasional rose bush, the fungal disease has never been considered a problem for humans. Until this year.

In what researchers suggest is the first reported case of its kind, a 61-year-old Indian mycologist appears to have contracted a rather serious case of silver leaf disease in his own throat, providing a rare example of a pathogen seemingly making an enormous leap across entire kingdoms in the tree of life.