The hunt for the origins of SARS-CoV-2 will look beyond China: The virus may have been born in South-East Asia

‘John Bell, a professor of medicine at the University of Oxford, says everyone thought there would be a flood of cases in Vietnam because the country is right across the border from China. Yet Vietnam has reported only 300 in a population of 100m, and no deaths. The country did not have a great lockdown either, he adds. Nobody could work out what was going on.

‘One explanation, he suggests, is that Vietnam’s population is not as immunologically “naive” as has been assumed. The circulation of other sars-like viruses could have conferred a generalised immunity to such pathogens.’

Read here (The Economist, July 22, 2020)

The coronavirus may not have originated in China, says Oxford professor

‘The coronavirus may have been lying dormant across the world until emerging under favourable environmental conditions, rather than originating in China, an expert has claimed.

‘Dr Tom Jefferson, from the Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine (CEBM) at Oxford University, has pointed to a string of recent discoveries of the virus’s presence around the world before it emerged in Asia as growing evidence of its true origin as a global organism that was waiting for favourable conditions to finally emerge.

‘Traces of COVID-19 have been found in sewage samples from Spain, Italy and Brazil which pre-date its discovery in China. A preprint study, which has not been peer reviewed, claims to have found the presence of SARS-CoV-2 genomes in a Barcelona sewage sample from 12 March 2019.’

Read here (BBC Science Focus, July 6, 2020)

Coronavirus traces found in March 2019 sewage sample, Spanish study shows

‘Spanish virologists have found traces of the novel coronavirus in a sample of Barcelona waste water collected in March 2019, nine months before the Covid-19 disease was identified in China, the University of Barcelona said on Friday (June 26). The discovery of virus genome presence so early in Spain, if confirmed, would imply the disease may have appeared much earlier than the scientific community thought.’

Read here (Straits Times, June 27, 2020)

Fact-checking claims coronavirus might have started in August 2019

‘There's been criticism of a study from the US suggesting that the coronavirus could have been present in the Chinese city of Wuhan as early as August last year. The study by Harvard University, which gained significant publicity when it was released earlier this month, has been dismissed by China and had its methodology challenged by independent scientists...

‘The Harvard study has gained a lot of traction in the media, with President Trump, who has been highly critical of China's pandemic response, tweeting a Fox News item highlighting the researchers' findings. The tweet has been viewed more than three million times.’

Read here (BBC, June 15, 2020)

Evidence for limited early spread of Covid-19 within the United States, January–February 2020

‘The first US cases of nontravel–related COVID-19 were confirmed on February 26 and 28, 2020, suggesting that community transmission was occurring by late February... Four separate lines of evidence (syndromic surveillance, virus surveillance, phylogenetic analysis, and retrospectively identified cases) suggest that limited U.S. community transmission likely began in late January or early February 2020, after a single importation from China, followed by multiple importations from Europe. Until late February, COVID-19 incidence was too low to be detected by emergency department syndromic surveillance for COVID-19–like illness... Enhanced syndromic and virus surveillance will be needed to monitor COVID-19 trends for the duration of the pandemic.’

Read here (US CDC, May 29, 2020)

The fable of the Chinese whistleblower

‘While initial contact between the two CDCs [of the US and China] was interrupted by the New Year holiday, the coordination between the two countries’ public health officials was much closer – and, as WHO Disease Outbreak documentation verifies, the time lags were considerably shorter – than is widely believed in the West. The contrast with America’s response is striking. Whereas 27 days passed from Zhang’s initial report to the Wuhan shutdown on January 23, the US took exactly twice as long (54 days) to go from its first official diagnosis of COVID-19 (January 20) to Trump’s declaration of national emergency (March 13).’

Read here (Project Syndicate, March 18, 2020)

World Health Assembly: what is it, and what is the coronavirus inquiry proposal?

‘A key conference paper, already filed ahead of the assembly, and supported by 122 countries, including the members of the European Union and the African Group, the UK, Russia, Canada, Australia and New Zealand, calls for a systemic review of the world’s response to Covid-19. “Initiate, at the earliest appropriate moment, and in consultation with member states, a stepwise process of impartial, independent and comprehensive evaluation ... to review experience gained and lessons learned from the WHO-coordinated international health response to Covid-19.”

‘The draft motion does not mention China or Wuhan (the city where the virus was first detected) by name. But it urges the global health community to: “... identify the zoonotic source of the virus and the route of introduction to the human population, including the possible role of intermediate hosts, including through efforts such as scientific and collaborative field missions.”

And the paper argues the response to the pandemic must be global. The motion: “… calls for the universal, timely and equitable access to and fair distribution of all quality, safe, efficacious and affordable essential health technologies and products including their components and precursors required in the response to the Covid-19 pandemic as a global priority.”

Read here (The Guardian, May 18, 2020)

Download the 73rd WHA, Agenda Item 3, ‘Covid-19 response’ draft resolution here

The lost six weeks when US failed to contain outbreak: BBC video

‘Having watched Asian and European countries struggle against Covid-19, the US was slow to ramp up testing and order its residents to stay at home. We look at this crucial time period and what exactly was done to prevent the outbreak.’

View here (BBC, May 12, 2020)

France had Covid-19 in November, hospital says after analysis of chest scans

‘Study finds person who had the disease 10 weeks earlier than the country detected cases. Contagion believed to have spread slowly until the end of February before accelerating rapidly...

Read here (South China Morning Post, May 8, 2020)

US mayor says he had coronavirus last year, worried people dismissed it as bad flu

‘Michael Melham, the mayor of Belleville, New Jersey, told the Global Times via a statement that he visited his primary care physician on April 29 and asked to have his blood tested for antibodies related to COVID-19 as he suspected that he had been potentially positive for coronavirus in late November, but dismissed it because he kept hearing the first cases were in January.

‘The US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention announced on January 21 the first case was a man who had returned to the Seattle area after visiting Wuhan.

‘Within five minutes of the blood test, the doctor shared the positive antibody results with the mayor, prompting Melham to think back to the New Jersey League of Municipalities Conference in Atlantic City in November, when he recalled driving back up the Garden State Parkway on Thursday, November 21 not feeling well, suspecting the reason was a mix of exhaustion and dehydration from the three-day event.’

Read here (Global Times, May 7, 2020)

Genetic mutation study finds new coronavirus spread swiftly around the world in late 2019

‘A genetic analysis of samples from more than 7,500 people infected with Covid-19 suggests that the new coronavirus spread quickly around the world late last year and is adapting to its human hosts, scientists said on Wednesday (May 6). A study by scientists at University College London's (UCL) Genetics Institute found almost 200 recurrent genetic mutations of the new coronavirus - Sars-CoV-2 - which the researchers said showed how it may be evolving as it spreads in people.’

Read here (Straits Times, May 6, 2020)

When did Covid-19 first appear in the US?

‘A US mayor claims he had COVID-19 last November, over one month before China reported its initial cases. If this was really the case, how did he get it and from where? How long ago did the virus start spreading in the US? In this episode of Getting to the Point, CGTN anchor Liu Xin asks the big question.’

View here (CGTN, Youtube, May 6, 2020)

Cook County searching for overlooked COVID-19 deaths as far back as November just ‘to cover our bases’

‘The Cook County Medical Examiner’s Office is planning to review a “handful” of cases dating as far back as November to determine whether some earlier coronavirus deaths were overlooked. “We don’t anticipate having [coronavirus] cases from November, but if we found that we had cases in November, we might want to look even earlier,” Derevyanny said. “Again, we don’t anticipate that, we just want to cover our bases and make sure that we have the most complete data we can for COVID-19.”

Read here (Chicago Sun Times, May 5, 2020)

French doctors say they found a Covid-19 patient from December

‘There's new evidence that the coronavirus may have been in France weeks earlier than was previously thought. Doctors at a Paris hospital say they've found evidence that one patient admitted in December was infected with Covid-19. If verified, this finding would show that the virus was already circulating in Europe at that time -- well before the first known cases were diagnosed in France or hotspot Italy.’

Read here (CNN, May 4, 2020)

SARS-COV-2 was already spreading in France in late December 2019

Summary of the report:

• Covid-19 was already spreading in France in late December 2019, a month before the official first cases in the country.
• Early community spreading changes our knowledge of covid-19 epidemic.
• This new case changes our understanding of the epidemic and modeling studies should adjust to this new data.

Read here (Science Direct, May 3, 2020)

It’s unfair to blame China for coronavirus pandemic, Lancet editor tells state media

‘The editor-in-chief of The Lancet has said it is “not helpful” and “unfair” to blame China for being the source of the Covid-19 pandemic in an interview with Chinese state media. Richard Horton said the international community should instead work with the Chinese authorities in dealing with the outbreak.

‘His comments came after the US top spy agency said that the intelligence community did not believe the virus had been man-made or genetically modified, but said it will continue to examine whether the outbreak “began through contact with infected animals or if it was the result of an accident at a laboratory in Wuhan”.’

Read here (South China Morning Post, May 2, 2020)

The pieces of the puzzle of covid-19’s origin are coming to light

‘Many scientists think that with so many biologists actively hunting for bat viruses, and gain-of-function work becoming more common, the world is at increasing risk of a laboratory-derived pandemic at some point. “One of my biggest hopes out of this pandemic is that we address this issue—it really worries me,” says Dr Pilch. Today there are around 70 bsl-4 sites in 30 countries. More such facilities are planned...

‘The question of whether they really are [unrecognised zoonoses], and how those threats may stack up, needs attention. That attention needs laboratories. It also needs a degree of open co-operation that America is now degrading with accusations and reductions in funding, and that China has taken steps to suppress at source. That suppression has done nothing to help the country; indeed, by supporting speculation, it may yet harm it.’

Read here (The Economist, May 2, 2020)

Did China cover-up the Covid-19 outbreak?

As the global effort to control Covid-19 continues so arguments about culpability for the spread of the pandemic intensify. At the centre of the story is China, where the outbreak began. Did the Chinese government’s impulse to cover up the truth cost the world dear? Or did China respond with admirable determination? HARDtalk’s Stephen Sackur speaks to the veteran Chinese Ambassador in London Liu Xiaoming. Is China the villain or the hero of this pandemic?

View here (BBC, Youtube, April 29, 2020)

Covid-19 has a grandma, grandpa and great grandpa. Where are they?

‘In an unusual move last weekend, China’s envoy to Moscow, Zhang Hanhui highlighted that the whole story about Covid-19 is only unfolding and there are surprises in store for the world community.  It is inconceivable that Ambassador Zhang spoke without the knowledge of Beijing. Significantly, the Chinese envoy chose the Russian state news agency Tass for making some startling disclosures.’ The Tass story is entitled “Ambassador says coronavirus imported to China, points to genetic sequence as proof”.

Read here (Indian Punchline, April 21, 2020)

County of Santa Clara identifies three additional early COVID-19 deaths -- much earlier than the one on March 9, 2020, originally thought to be the first in the US

‘The County of Santa Clara Medical Examiner-Coroner has identified three individuals who died with COVID-19 in Santa Clara County before the COVID-19 associated death on March 9, 2020, originally thought to be the first death associated with COVID-19 in the county.

‘The Medical Examiner-Coroner performed autopsies on two individuals who died at home on February 6, 2020 and February 17, 2020. Samples from the two individuals were sent to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.  Today, the Medical Examiner-Coroner received confirmation from the CDC that tissue samples from both cases are positive for SARS-CoV-2 (the virus that causes COVID-19).’

Read here (Santa Clara County Public Health, April 21, 2020)