As bad as cancer is in humans, at least it’s not contagious. The same can’t be said for clams, mussels, and other marine bivalves. According to a new study, published online today in Nature, these creatures can suffer from a form of cancer similar to leukemia that appears to be transmitted through the water and can pass not only between members of one species, but even between two different ones. This type of transmissible cancer has also been discovered in several mammals including Tasmanian devils and certain species of dogs. The new results in bivalves, the authors suggest, show that some animals are more susceptible to phenomenon, but humans are in the clear—at least, so far.
http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2016/06/contagious-cancer-found-clams-and-mussels
