Amid Nipah Virus Hospitalizations in India, Many Are Wondering if This Virus Is Deadly

While we collectively did our best to overcome the so-called "winter vomiting disease," a terrifying measles outbreak once described as having "no end in sight" continued to impact the public in multiple states. Now, roughly a half-decade after the Nipah virus outbreak in India tragically claimed far too many lives, people around the world are wondering: is the Nipah virus deadly, and is a pandemic once more on the horizon?

The Nipah virus is once again in the news, and the details are grim.

As multiple hospitalizations in India occur amid the reappearance of the Nipah virus, many are wondering how the virus spreads, how its symptoms present, if other cases have occurred but have gone unreported, and whether or not the virus is deadly.

Continue reading to learn all of the pressing details you must know about the Nipah virus and whether or not it is of the deadly variety.

Yes, the Nipah virus is deadly. According to the World Health Organization, the Nipah virus has an estimated fatality rate between 40% and 75%, which is an immense concern among people living in regions without adequate access to healthcare and proper emergency medical services.

As the Daily Mirror notes, the pathogen inspired the Hollywood film Contagion.

As reported in The Telegraph, two nurses working at the private Narayana Multispeciality Hospital in Barasat, West Bengal, have been confirmed to have contracted the Nipah virus.

The two nurses worked together between Dec. 28 and Dec. 30, 2025, and began developing "high fevers and respiratory distress" between Dec. 31 and Jan. 2. The two nurses were admitted to their hospital's intensive care unit by Jan. 4.

“Two nurses at a private hospital are infected with Nipah virus, and one of them is in critical condition,” the West Bengal Health and Family Welfare Department's Principal Secretary, Narayan Swaroop Nigam, told The Telegraph.

One of the two nurses is currently in a coma, per the report, and officials believe that the nurses caught the virus while treating a patient "with severe respiratory symptoms" who died before proper testing could occur.

“The most likely source of infection is a patient who had been admitted to the same hospital previously. That individual is being treated as the suspected index case, and investigations are ongoing,” a senior health official involved in the case told The Telegraph.

Part of what has been troubling health officials so much is that in some human cases, those who have been infected may be asymptomatic. Therefore, there may very well be more undocumented cases of Nipah virus infections in India — or elsewhere — due to a lack of symptoms presenting.

However, as the World Health Organization notes, symptoms may also present as mild or severe acute respiratory infection and fatal encephalitis.

Additional symptoms, per the World Health Organization, include: fever, headaches, muscle pain, vomiting, sore throat, dizziness, drowsiness, altered consciousness, and acute encephalitis. Those who survive this deadly pathogen have reported long-term neurological conditions.

While there are currently no vaccines available to protect against the Nipah virus, this bat-borne pathogen can be controlled, in part, by limiting human-to-bat interactions and washing fruits before eating them.