Coronavirus Animals China
Experts speculate that the endangered pangolin is the intermediary host between bats and humans for the coronavirus. Photograph: Roslan Rahman/AFP via Getty Images
Chinese researchers investigating the animal origin of the coronavirus outbreak in China have said that the endangered pangolin may be the “missing link” between bats and humans.
Bats are known carriers of the latest strain of the disease, which has infected at least 31, 000 people and killed more than 630 worldwide, mostly in China where the outbreak started.
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A genetic analysis showed that the strain of the virus currently spreading among humans was 96% identical to that found in bats.
But according to Arnaud Fontanet, from France’s Pasteur Institute, the disease did not jump straight from bats to humans. “We think there’s another animal that’s an intermediary, ” he told AFP.
The Sars outbreak of 2002-3, involving a different strain of coronavirus, was transferred to humans by the civet, a small mammal whose meat is considered a delicacy in China.
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Many animals are capable of transmitting viruses to other species, and nearly all strains of coronavirus contagious to humans originated in wildlife.
Several studies have shown that the bat-borne virus lacks the necessary hardware to latch onto human cell receptors. But it’s still not clear which animal is the missing link.
After testing more than 1, 000 samples from wild animals, scientists at the South China Agricultural University found that the genome sequences of viruses in pangolins to be 99% identical to those on coronavirus patients, the official Xinhua news agency reported.
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But other experts urged caution. “This is not scientific evidence, ” said James Wood, head of the department of veterinary medicine at the University of Cambridge. “Investigations into animal reservoirs are extremely important, but results must be then be published for international scrutiny.”
To conclusively identify the culprit, researchers would need to test each species that was on sale at the market – a near impossibility given that it is now permanently closed.
Martine Peeters, a virologist at France’s Institute for Research and Development (IRD), was part of the team that identified the host animal of the Ebola virus during recent epidemics.
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They found that it was indeed a bat that passed the virus on to humans, and Peeters believes that is likely to be the case this time around. During her Ebola research, “we collected thousands of bat dropping from several sites in Africa, ” Peeters told AFP.
“They say they’ve analysed samples from a rubbish truck, ” he said. “They don’t say which, but I think it’s likely to have been excrement that was just lying around.”
While it may be too late for this outbreak, identifying the carrier animal for the novel coronavirus could prove vital in preventing future flare-ups.
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Eric Leroy, a virologist and vet at the IRD said that the search could well turn up a result quickly, as with Sars. Equally, it could take years. “With Ebola, research started in 1976 and we didn’t see the first results published until 2005, ” he told AFP.
One determining factor could be what percentage of the same species are infected. “If that’s low, less than 1% for example, that’s obviously going to lower the chance you stumble upon an infected animal, ” said Leroy.
For Fontanet, coronavirus is just the latest example of the potentially disastrous consequence of humans consuming virus-carrying wild animals. He said that China needed to “take pretty radical measures against the sale of wild animals in markets”.
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“Each time, we try to put out the fire, and once it’s out we await the next one, ” said François Renaud, a researcher at the Paris-based National Centre for Scientific Research.
He recommended compiling a watch list of all animals that could potentially transmit viruses to humans. “You need to see epidemics before they come, and therefore you need to be proactive, ” he said.And they say further surveillance of wild pangolins is needed to understand their role in the risk of future transmission to humans.
Two groups of coronaviruses related to the virus behind the human pandemic have been identified in Malayan pangolins smuggled into China, said lead researcher Dr Tommy Lam of The University of Hong Kong.
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Although their role as the intermediate host of the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak remains to be confirmed, sale of these wild animals in wet markets should be strictly prohibited to avoid future zoonotic [animal to human] transmission, he told News.
Bats also contain coronaviruses, which are closer still to the human virus, except in one key area - the part that helps the virus invade cells.
This tells us that viruses that look pretty adapted to humans are present in wildlife, said co-researcher, Prof Edward Holmes of the University of Sydney. Bats are certainly involved, pangolins may be, but it is very possible that other animal species are involved as well.
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Exactly how the virus jumped from a wild animal, presumably a bat, to another animal and then humans remains a mystery. The horseshoe bat and the pangolin have both been implicated, but the precise sequence of events is unknown.
Finding the virus in smuggled Malayan pangolins raised the question of where they contracted the virus, said Dr Lam. Was it from bats along the trafficking route to China or in their native habitats in Southeast Asia?
Conservationists say it would be devastating if the discovery led to further persecution of the endangered mammal. The animal's scales are in high demand for use in traditional Chinese medicine, while pangolin meat is considered a delicacy.
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This is the time for the international community to pressure their governments to end illegal wildlife trade, said Elisa Panjang of Cardiff University, a pangolin conservation officer at the Danau Girang Field Centre in Malaysia.
China has moved to ban the consumption of meat from wild animals in the wake of the outbreak. Similar moves are being considered in Vietnam.
Prof Andrew Cunningham of Zoological Society of London (ZSL) said it was important not to jump to conclusions from the paper. The source of the detected coronavirus really is unknown - it might have been a natural pangolin virus or have jumped from another species between capture and death.
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And Dr Dan Challender, of the University of Oxford, said pangolins are known to host various strains of coronaviruses. Identifying the source of SARS-CoV-2 is important to understand the emergence of the current pandemic, and in preventing similar events in the future, he said.
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