Muscat: The COVID-19 pandemic could have originated from certain naturally occurring viruses present in pangolins and bats, a new report released by the World Health Organization has said.
Although the mode of transmission to humans from animals in which the coronavirus is naturally found is not yet known, the report states that the Huanan market in Wuhan province, long rumoured to be one of the sources of the virus, was not where it first originated.
“Genome analysis reveals that bats may be the source of SARS-CoV-2,” said the report. “However, the specific route of transmission from natural reservoirs to humans remains unclear. Initial analysis revealed that the SARS-CoV-2 genome was closely related to SARS-like coronaviruses previously found in bats, and the whole-genome sequence identity of the novel virus has 96.2 percent similarity to a bat SARS-related coronavirus.”
“Current studies have demonstrated that Malayan pangolins hosted two sub-lineages of SARS-CoV-2-related coronaviruses,” the WHO report added. “In the first study, animals, including four Chinese pangolins and 25 Malayan pangolins, had been obtained during anti-smuggling operations by the Guangdong customs in March and August 2019. The viruses from the animals shared a genomic similarity of 90.1 percent to SARS-CoV-2.”
