The Last of US shows a world overtaken by zombies stemming from a fungal infection, but could humans someday be controlled by mushrooms? Well, the world is changing and the science fiction of it isn’t as far off as you might imagine.
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00:00HBO's The Last of Us, based off the PlayStation game of the same name, shows us a different
00:08kind of zombie apocalypse.
00:10The story is rooted not in some unknown disease that turns people into flesh-eating monsters,
00:14but rather a known fungus that really exists, called Cordyceps.
00:18The fungus is able to infect insects and take over their bodies just like the zombies from
00:22the series.
00:23In real life, the fungus forces the insects to climb to a high point, where it then anchors
00:27and blooms like this, releasing spores from above and possibly infecting more insects,
00:32or like in The Last of Us, more humans.
00:34In the show, they begin the series by detailing how this type of fungus cannot survive in
00:38the human body, because we run too hot, but if it evolved, it could be possible.
00:42But is that fact or fiction?
00:43Experts say controlling the human mind would take more from Cordyceps than simply being
00:47able to acclimate to the human body, but they add they would never say never, as fungi do
00:51contain mind-bending hallucinogens, like psilocybin, and fungal-related illnesses are on the rise.
00:57With the chief of the fungal disease branch of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and
01:00Prevention, Tim Chiller, telling Insider,
01:02I'm not going to be surprised that more fungi emerge as human pathogens.
01:06They become more challenging to treat and more infectious.
01:09And the very real fear is that these fungal infections do get worse and spread more widely.
01:13And just like in the show, there's no cure and no vaccine for these types of infections.