A new study, in which researchers from several countries have participated, has corroborated that the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, responsible for the COVID-19 pandemicis located in the Huanan fish market, in the Chinese district of Wuhan (Hubei province).
This has been verified by scientists from several countries, coordinated by the French National Center for Scientific Research (CNRS) and the University of Arizona (United States), and the results of this collaborative work have been published in the scientific journal Cell.
The work provides a list of the wildlife species present on the market from which SARS-CoV-2, the virus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic, most likely emerged at the end of 2019, reports the extract provided to the magazine by the research centers.
The study is based on a new analysis of data published by the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), data that comes from more than 800 samples collected in and around the Huanan seafood wholesale market. as of January 1, 2020, and from reported viral genomes from the first COVID patients.
The largest volume of data collected
Researchers maintain that this is one of the most important data sets that exist on the origin of the pandemic, and that the new results support the idea that infected animals were introduced to the market in mid-to-late November 2019. , what triggered the pandemic.
On January 1, 2020, after the animals were removed and just hours after the market closed, researchers from the Chinese CDC went to the market to collect samples.
They took samples of the floor, walls and other surfaces of the stalls; They returned days later to focus on the surfaces of the wildlife stalls, such as a cage and the carts used to transport the animals, and they also collected samples from the drains and sewers.
The Chinese team carried out sequencing of the samples to obtain all the RNA sequences (and can also capture DNA) of all the organisms present in the samples: viruses, bacteria, plants, animals and humans.
The CDC researchers published their data and results in 2023 in the journal Nature, but have now pointed out in Cell that that article left unresolved the exact identities of the animal species found in the data that could represent plausible intermediate hosts, although those data from Their sequencing remained in public and open repositories.
Viruses in “raccoon dogs” and “civet cats”
According to the latest analysis of this data, the SARS-CoV-2 virus was present in some of the same stalls as wild animals sold at the market, including “raccoon dogs” (small fox-like animals with raccoon-like markings) and “civet cats” (small carnivorous mammals related to mongooses and hyenas).
In some cases, genetic material from the SARS-CoV-2 virus and of these animals in the same swabs.
Many of the key animal species had been eliminated before the Chinese research teams arrived, according to the article published in Cell, so there is no direct evidence that the animals were infected.
These are the same types of animals that facilitated the spread of the SARS coronavirus to humans in 2002, maintain the researchers, who have warned that this is the most risky thing that can be done: “catch wild animals full of viruses and then play with fire, putting them in contact with human beings who live in the heart of large cities, whose population density facilitates the take hold of these viruses.”
Threats to global health and safety
The new study found a short list of wildlife market animal species found in or near the viral samples that could represent the most likely intermediate hosts of SARS-CoV-2.
They include the “common raccoon dog”, a species susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 and which carried SARS-CoV in 2003, and which turned out to be the most genetically abundant animal in samples from the market’s wild animal stalls.
At one post, genetic material from the coronavirus was also found in “palm civets”which were also associated with the previous SARS-CoV outbreak; and in other species, such as the “bamboo rat” and Malayan porcupines, they were also found in samples positive for SARS-CoV-2, in addition to “a multitude of other species.”
Researchers have stressed the importance of understanding the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic, especially in light of other recent spreads, such as that of the bird flu virus in livestock in the United States.
(With information from EFE)
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