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According to an expert from the WHO detachment investigating the origins of COVID-19, the coronavirus may have reached humans on wildlife farms in southern China, the NPR writes. The World Health Organization may issue a report summarizing the results of the investigation over the next two weeks.
Peter daszak the ecologist was a member of a delegation that traveled to China this year to investigate the pathogen. The investigation found evidence that the animals were being transported from the farms in question to one of the Wuhan markets. According to Daszak, the farms were closed in February 2020 and the government’s reaction is quite revealing.
The farms belonged to a project that China has been running for nearly 20 years helping to eradicate rural poverty.
According to Daszak, the project proved to be very successful, in 2016 there were already 14 million people working at such sites.
It is also surprising that in February 2020, shortly after the outbreak of the epidemic, there was a sudden change. The farms were liquidated and the government issued precise instructions on how to destroy the animals so that they could not transmit pathogens. Daszak suspects that SARS-CoV-2 simply spread from a bat to another beast and then to humans on a farm.
A significant proportion of farms are located in and around Yunnan, a pathogen previously found in bats that is 96 percent genetically identical to SARS-CoV-2 has previously been identified in the province. Additionally, farms breed organisms that carry coronaviruses, such as civet cats and pinworms.
Finally, the delegation also found that the sites cater to suppliers from the Huanan Marine Wholesale Market in Wuhan. The first cases of COVID-19 can be attributed to this, the market was closed on December 31, 2019 and positive samples were collected from various live animals.
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