No evidence of coronaviruses or other potentially zoonotic viruses in Sunda pangolins (<i>Manis javanica</i>) entering the wildlife trade via Malaysia

Ashraf

Emerging Microbes & Infections

et al. 2020

Coronaviruses (CoVs) are enveloped, positive sense, single-stranded RNA viruses. The viruses have adapted to infect a large number of animal species, ranging from bats to camels. At present, seven CoVs infect humans, of which Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) is responsible for causing the Coronavirus Disease 2019 (COVID-19) in humans. Since its emergence in late 2019, SARS-CoV-2 has spread rapidly across the globe. Healthcare systems around the globe have been stretched beyond their limits posing new challenges to emergency healthcare services and critical care. The outbreak continues to jeopardize human health, social life and economy. All known human CoVs have zoonotic origins. Recent detection of SARS-CoV-2 in pet, zoo and certain farm animals has highlighted its potential for reverse zoonosis. This scenario is particularly alarming, since these animals could be potential reservoirs for secondary zoonotic infections. In this article, we highlight interspecies SARS-CoV-2 infections and focus on the reverse zoonotic potential of this virus. We also emphasize the importance of potential secondary zoonotic events and the One-Health and One-World approach to tackle such future pandemics.

Section: Sars-cov-2 Interspecies Infectionssupporting

confidence: 58%

Section: Sars-cov-2 Interspecies Infectionsmentioning

confidence: 97%

Zoonotic and reverse zoonotic events of SARS-CoV-2 and their impact on global health

Ashraf

Emerging Microbes & Infections

et al. 2020

“…In addition, a recent study that investigated the possible role of pangolins as a source of potential zoonoses further exonerates the small mammal as potential intermediate host of COVID-19 47 . Throat and rectal swabs were collected from 334 Sunda pangolins (Manis javanica) confiscated and rescued from the wild in Peninsular Malaysia, and Sabah between August 2009 and March 2019 47 . No sample yielded a positive PCR result for any of the targeted viral families-Coronaviridae, Filoviridae, Flaviviridae, Orthomyxoviridae, and Paramyxoviridae 47 .…”

Section: Civet Cat and Pangolin: The Unlikely Scapegoats Of The Two Ementioning

confidence: 99%

“…Throat and rectal swabs were collected from 334 Sunda pangolins (Manis javanica) confiscated and rescued from the wild in Peninsular Malaysia, and Sabah between August 2009 and March 2019 47 . No sample yielded a positive PCR result for any of the targeted viral families-Coronaviridae, Filoviridae, Flaviviridae, Orthomyxoviridae, and Paramyxoviridae 47 . The authors suggested that the lack of coronavirus detection in their samples might suggest that the previous detection of the virus in these animal species could reflect their exposure to infected humans, wildlife, or other animals within the wildlife trade network 47 .…”

Section: Civet Cat and Pangolin: The Unlikely Scapegoats Of The Two Ementioning

confidence: 99%

COVID19: an announced pandemic

2020

A severe upper respiratory tract syndrome caused by the new coronavirus has now spread to the entire world as a highly contagious pandemic. The large scale explosion of the disease is conventionally traced back to January of this year in the Chinese province of Hubei, the wet markets of the principal city of Wuhan being assumed to have been the specific causative locus of the sudden explosion of the infection. A number of findings that are now coming to light show that this interpretation of the origin and history of the pandemic is overly simplified. A number of variants of the coronavirus would in principle have had the ability to initiate the pandemic well before January of this year. However, even if the COVID-19 had become, so to say, ready, conditions in the local environment would have had to prevail to induce the loss of the biodiversity’s “dilution effect” that kept the virus under control, favoring its spillover from its bat reservoir to the human target. In the absence of these appropriate conditions only abortive attempts to initiate the pandemic could possibly occur: a number of them did indeed occur in China, and probably elsewhere as well. These conditions were unfortunately present at the wet marked in Wuhan at the end of last year.

“…The authors hypothesized that pangolins were an incidental host of coronaviruses potentially due to exposure to infected humans and other smuggled animals. 8 In the scenario where only two batches of smuggled pangolins possess these SARS-like CoVs, the CoVs could have come from other species held in captivity given the potentially broad host tropism of the related SARS-CoV-2 spike 9–12 and the fact that each of the two groups of smuggled pangolins carried a single CoV strain. For instance, a Hong Kong smuggling bust in 2014 discovered 40 boxes of pangolin and masked palm civet meat 13 (palm civets were an intermediate host of SARS-CoV, 2002-2004).…”

mentioning

confidence: 99%

Single source of pangolin CoVs with a near identical Spike RBD to SARS-CoV-2

Chan

Zhan

2020

Preprint

AbstractMultiple publications have independently described pangolin CoV genomes from the same batch of smuggled pangolins confiscated in Guangdong province in March, 2019. We analyzed the three metagenomic datasets that sampled this batch of pangolins and found that the two complete pangolin CoV genomes, GD_1 by Xiao et al. Nature and MP789 by Liu et al. PLoS Pathogens, were both built primarily using the 2019 dataset first described by Liu et al. Viruses. Other publications, such as Zhang et al. Current Biology and Lam et al. Nature, have also relied on this same dataset by Liu et al. Viruses for their assembly of pangolin CoV sequences and comparisons to SARS-CoV-2. To our knowledge, all of the published pangolin CoV genome sequences that share a nearly identical Spike receptor binding domain with SARS-CoV-2 originate from this single batch of smuggled pangolins. This raises the question of whether pangolins are truly reservoirs or hosts of SARS-CoV-2-related coronaviruses in the wild, or whether the pangolins may have contracted the CoV from another host species during trafficking. Our observations highlight the importance of requiring authors to publish their complete genome assembly pipeline and all contributing raw sequence data, particularly those supporting epidemiological investigations, in order to empower peer review and independent analysis of the sequence data.