Could a fungal pandemic turn us all into zombies? - BBC

Dr Charissa de Bekker, a microbiologist at Utrecht University, has studied how Cordyceps creates zombified ants and says she cannot see the same ever happening in people.

Only a handful of the millions of species of fungi cause disease, but some of them can be so much worse than an irritating bout of Athlete's foot or an infected toenail.

These include the sudden emergence of a deadly superbug, Candida auris - and a fungi, Mucormycetes, that eats our flesh so quickly that it leads to severe facial injuries.

Dr Neil Stone invites me to Health Services Laboratory (HSL) in London, where samples from UK patients are analysed to see if their infections are caused by a fungus and what treatments may work.

"When you have a piece of fruit and the next day it's turned to mush, that's because it has had a mucor-fungus [Mucormycetes] inside of it," says Dr Rebecca Gorton, a clinical scientist at HSL.

He thinks the threat is there because of "the pure volume of fungi in the environment... climate change, international travel, increasing number of cases and their deep neglect in terms of treatments we have".