Talk:Orthohantavirus

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Etymology section; significance of "ortho-"

It'd be nice to move the bit about the Hantan River into an "Etymology" section, and to explain there the significance of the "ortho-" prefix apparently added later. --Dan Harkless (talk) 07:43, 8 March 2019 (UTC)

Italics for taxa of viruses

I understood that viral taxa (unlike other higher taxa) were all italicised? Has this changed recently? (And, as an aside, spaced em dashes are not style for parenthetical phrases – one can use either spaced en dashes or unspaced em dashes.) Espresso Addict (talk) 23:22, 26 March 2019 (UTC)

Oh! I was ignorant to any different treatment for viruses. WP:Manual of Style/Capital letters § Animals, plants, and other organisms and some other pages I had consulted in the past for the italicization rules currently say nothing about viruses being treated differently. However, Wikipedia:Manual of Style § Animals, plants, and other organisms (which ironically refers the reader to the former link for the definitive rules) currently has:

When using taxonomic ("scientific") names, capitalize and italicize the genus: Berberis, Erithacus. (Supergenus and subgenus, when applicable, are treated the same way.) Italicize but do not capitalize taxonomic ranks at the level of species and below: Berberis darwinii, Erithacus rubecula superbus, Acacia coriacea subsp. sericophylla; no exception is made for proper names forming part of scientific names. Higher taxa (order, family, etc.) are capitalized in Latin (Carnivora, Felidae) but not in their English equivalents (carnivorans, felids); they are not italicized in either form, except for viruses, where all names accepted by the ICTV are italicized (Retroviridae).

So per those rules, one must check the appropriate ICTV pages for each viral name to see whether to italicize it or not. Ugh. And then Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Organisms § Scientific names gives very different, context-dependent (but apparently not ICTV-approval-hinging) rules:

For viruses, the recent formal convention is to italicize and capitalize the order and everything below it, including capitalizing the first letter of the species name (but not of subsequent words in the species name). This italicization convention should only be used for virus infoboxes and otherwise within virology articles; it is not common outside this context even in academic journals, and should not be used in other categories of articles, as its double inconsistency will be confusing to readers and to non-specialist editors. The Manual of Style advises us, across all style issues, to be consistent within an article and to write for broad not narrow understanding. When editing an article that mixes viral and other topics, use the italicization and capitalization conventions of the non-viral topic, as this increases site-wide consistency and is less jarring for readers (e.g., in an article on cattle health, use the ICZN not ICTV style). Examples: In a virology article, use within Herpesviridae, genus Cytomegalovirus belongs to the Betaherpesvirinae subfamily, but otherwise use within Herpesviridae, genus Cytomegalovirus belongs to the Betaherpesvirinae subfamily. Virus species names are often abbreviated, e.g. HIV, HHV-5, etc.; these short forms are not italicized and do not use periods (full points) between the acronym letters. Unlike in other fields, non-abbreviated genus and species epithets in virology can even be multi-word, and overlapping (redundantly worded): Influenza A virus is a species in the genus Influenzavirus A.

So I guess per those rules, since Orthohantavirus is presumably considered a virology article (even though it's one that laymen are a lot more likely to visit than most), your italicization of all the viral names was the right move. Of course the box at the top of Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Organisms warns that it's just a draft, "must not be taken to represent consensus", and that 'references or links to this page should not describe it as "policy" nor yet even as a proposal'. But then the hatnote for the Scientific names section says "This section is complete and is already in use." How horribly confusing. It's a bummer that unlike articles, MoS pages don't use any references, so it's hard to tell how definitive anything is.

I guess bottom-line, it looks like your italicizing everything was valid from the perspective of at least one set of rules (and possibly two sets, if all those names are ICTV-approved), so if you'd like me to put them all back (not as simple as just reverting my edit, as I made valid fixes at the same time), just say the word. Or if you prefer to do it, I won't mess with it this time. 🙂

On the spaced em-dashes, well, em-dashes vary a lot in width in different styles of typography, and often the spaces are only omitted when it's one of the ridiculously wide em-dashes that's way wider than an 'm', but included in cases where it's an m-width em-dash (along with an n-width en-dash, a separate hyphen, and potentially a separate minus sign), and then sometimes narrow/half-spaces are used around them. But you're right, the Wikipedia MoS definitively states that em-dashes shouldn't be spaced here; I had remembered it being more flexible about the different styles, as in printed typography, but either it changed since then (I haven't looked that up in many years), or I was misremembering. I'll have to break myself of that habit — thanks. Er—thanks. In my browser, the en-dashes look so narrow (only barely discernable from a hyphen) that the " – " style looks awkward, but as your edits on those were Wikipedically correct, I'll put them back right now. Incidentally, I had to use ' 's just then to prevent a very awkward line-wrap, which is a sucky necessity; none of the suggested options in MOS:EMDASH are very nice for source readability, but I guess I should use one of them while I put your en-dashes back.

And finally, to your edit comment regarding starting a sentence with a numeral, thanks. Another one I was ignorant of (and that's not mentioned in the main Wikipedia:Manual of Style). However, note that Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Dates and numbers § Numbers as figures or words says this is an "avoid" case, not a "prohibited" case. But your semicolon compromise seems a good way to go.

P.S. It's an old habit from ASCII yesteryear, but I'm still signing my talk posts with two successive hyphens. 🤷 --Dan Harkless (talk) 16:02, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

@Dan Harkless: On virus italicisation, I just follow the style that WikiProject Viruses gives in its guidelines, which I understand as saying all formal taxon names should be italicised and capitalisd (Papillomaviridae), but not informal names for viruses (papillomavirus, HPV-16). It does conflict with other style guides but it is widely used on other virus pages. In this case I was interpreting it to mean that Hantaviridae and Bunyavirales should definitely be italicised, as should the formal species names eg Hantaan orthohantavirus, but the informal names can be left roman eg Sin Nombre virus. The word 'Bunyaviruses', as it is no longer a formal taxonomic term, should probably be lower case and roman, ie bunyavirus. (The rule is particularly confusing in this article because it talks extensively about mammalian taxons, which should definitely be roman!) However, this is not a virus group I'm at familiar with, so feel free to try to roll this out in the way that works best for this group.

PS Sorry about the panhandle structure mistake – I was trying to find an article to wikilink but we don't seem to have one – and the 's' must have got lost in the wash. Cheers, Espresso Addict (talk) 21:41, 27 March 2019 (UTC)

@Espresso Addict: Sorry for the slow reply — got real busy there. Thanks for the additional link to Wikipedia:WikiProject Viruses/Guidelines § Article mechanics supporting the italicization of virus orders and families. I would note, though, that while you characterized it as saying "all formal taxon names should be italicised and capitalised", it actually doesn't say anything one way or the other about phyla, classes, or realms. Wikipedia:Manual of Style § Animals, plants, and other organisms implies, but does not state outright, that all ICTV-approved virus taxa should be italicized, while Wikipedia:Manual of Style/Organisms § Scientific names specifically says to only italicize order and below ("for virus infoboxes and otherwise within virology articles"). Clearly virus taxonomy and nomenclature is still very much a work-in-progress. 🙂

Anyhow, I've just restored the italics you added that I prematurely reverted. Sorry for my ignorance of the emerging state of virus taxon italicization rules, and being too quick to use the word "incorrect". And thanks for the catch on the incorrectly capitalized "Bunyaviruses" — I'll fix that now. Oh, and on the "panhandle structures" singularization, gotcha, and no need to apologize. --Dan Harkless (talk) 00:09, 7 April 2019 (UTC)

New update: Hantavirus death in China

Source: https://www.firstpost.com/health/man-dies-from-hantavirus-in-china-all-you-need-to-know-about-the-virus-and-how-it-spreads-8184521.html 2409:4060:418:61AF:C026:5006:A2C1:6765 (talk) 13:31, 24 March 2020 (UTC)