‘With SARS, live-animal markets continued to sell infected animals for many months, allowing zoonotic spillover to be established as the origin and revealing multiple independent jumps from animals into humans. Unfortunately, no live mammal collected at Huanan Market or any other live-animal market in Wuhan has been screened for SARS-CoV-2–related viruses, and Huanan Market was closed and disinfected on 1 January 2020. Nevertheless, that most early symptomatic cases were linked to Huanan Market—specifically to the western section where raccoon dogs were caged—provides strong evidence of a live-animal market origin of the pandemic.
‘This would explain the extraordinary preponderance of early COVID-19 cases at one of the handful of sites in Wuhan—population 11 million—that sell some of the same animals that brought us SARS. Although it may never be possible to recover related viruses from animals if they were not sampled at the time of emergence, conclusive evidence of a Huanan Market origin from infected wildlife may nonetheless be obtainable through analysis of spatial patterns of early cases and from additional genomic data, including SARS-CoV-2–positive samples from Huanan Market, as well as through integration of additional epidemiologic data. Preventing future pandemics depends on this effort.’
Read here (Science, Nov 16, 2021)
