(CNN) The climate crisis may be to blame for the mysterious spread of a multidrug-resistant superbug, Candida auris, according to a study published Tuesday.

Until recently, scientists considered it a mystery how C. auris popped up in more than 30 countries around the globe a decade after it was first discovered in 2009 . It emerged simultaneously on three continents -- in India, Venezuela and South Africa -- between 2012 and 2015, each strain being genetically distinct.

The new study, published in the journal mBio, says this serious public health threat may be the first example of a new fungal disease emerging because of the climate crisis.

"The argument that we are making based on comparison to other close relative fungi is that as the climate has gotten warmer, some of these organisms, including Candida auris, have adapted to the higher temperature, and as they adapt, they break through human's protective temperatures," said co-author Dr. Arturo Casadevall , chairman of molecular microbiology and immunology at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health.

"Global warming may lead to new fungal diseases that we don't even know about right now."