viruses

Viruses can be found everywhere. However viruses are not living. Theses organisms are not living but as soon as they find a host they become active. Viruses are very interesting in that they only stick to things that they know. For instance plant viruses only affect plants and animal viruses only affect animals. Viruses are very small. They can be up to 10,000 times smaller than bacteria, or about one millionth of an inch. They are made up of a collection of genetic material encased in protein called capsid. Sometimes the capsid are covered by more proteins, lipids, and carbohydrates that might have spikes to help the viruses attach to host cells. This picture shows the different layers that are possible on a virus.

Viruses enter the body through the nose, mouth,  through your skin, or any opening in the body and they find a cell to be their host. So this why when somebody sneezes near you, you then get the virus, because the virus from their sneeze then goes in your nose or onto your skin. Once the virus gets inside the cell it makes a new virus and leaves that cell to go to contaminate other healthy cells in the body. When the virus leaves the cells it can leave in two ways. The first way is to break the host cell open, in this situation it destroys the host cell. The other way the virus can get out is to pinch out from the cell membrane, in this situation the host cell does not get destroyed. Either way the virus leaves it is still affecting the healthy cell and this is how viruses make you sick because they ruin the healthy cells. Doctors have made vaccines to prevent viruses because antibiotics do not get rid of viruses but some can stop them from spreading. So it is very hard to get rid of viruses. Sometimes they leave the body within a few weeks and other times they stay for years or even a lifetime. So since it is so hard to get rid of viruses the best thing to do is to prevent them. The first step in preventing viruses is good hygiene. The other way of prevention is vaccines. A vaccine is a small dose of the actual virus to get the body to build antibodies to fight against the specific germ. Some people also use home remedies to get rid of viruses or to prevent them. Most people are willing to do whatever it takes to get rid of viruses or to prevent them since they are so hard to get rid of and can become something very serious.

http://www.microbeworld.org/types-of-microbes/viruses

http://science.howstuffworks.com/life/cellular-microscopic/virus-human4.htm

http://www.humanillnesses.com/original/U-Z/Viral-Infections.html