Good morning. We are all going to die.

Well, 80% of us, anyway.

A PREVIOUSLY unknown virus that killed four of the five people it struck in an outbreak in South Africa last year has been identified as part of a family of viruses humans can catch from rats.

The virus, named Lujo, is an arenavirus that over nine days caused rash, fever, muscle pain, diarrhoea, severe bleeding, vomiting, organ failure and death, said Nivesh Sewlall, who treated the first patient at Johannesburg's Morningside MediClinic Hospital.

Coincidentally, these same symptoms seem to arise after listening to five sustained minutes of Glenn Beck's radio program.