Coronavirus didn’t originate in Wuhan, WHO confirms

THE World Health Organization’s (WHO) admission that Wuhan may not be the origin of Covid-19 may put to rest conspiracy theories that have placed the central Chinese city and China in a bad light over the virus’ origin, said Chinese epidemiologists. They urged for more research on transmission channels and virus hosts, which are vital for epidemiologic studies.

China’s door is wide open for more WHO epidemiologic studies while other countries should follow if the onus falls on them, said Chinese experts. They believe countries like the United States (US), which tops the world in number of confirmed Covid-19 cases, and certain European countries, where the virus was identified as early as last year, should also undergo a thorough investigation on the virus origin for a clearer picture.

Wuhan may not be the origin of the novel coronavirus, said senior WHO official Mike Ryan on Monday, announcing extensive studies to track down the animal species that transmitted the virus to humans.

“The fact that the fire alarm was triggered doesn’t necessarily mean that was where the disease crossed from animals to humans,” said Ryan at a press conference in Geneva.

His comments came as the organization’s team to China concluded its weeks-long mission, which was to lay the groundwork for further joint efforts at identifying the origin of the coronavirus.

On Tuesday, China’s National Health Commission said Chinese experts had kept in close contact with the two WHO experts, who stayed in China from July 11 to

August 2, about possible transmission channels and to identify the source of Covid-19 and the host of the virus.

Mounting facts and scientific evidence are emerging to support the hypothesis that the coronavirus did not originate in Wuhan, Zeng Guang, chief epidemiologist of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, told the Global Times, citing a sample of the virus found in Barcelona’s wastewater, collected as early as March 2019, and of the virus spotted in a sewer in Brazil in November

last year.

The fact that the outbreak was first reported in Wuhan and not in those countries may have something to do with the transmission medium or host of the virus, said Yang Zhanqiu, deputy director of the pathogen biology department at Wuhan University.

Zeng and Yang believe that the virus must have jumped from wild animals to human beings. Yang said they must identify the animal host and under what conditions the virus was passed.