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New Delhi: For months now, the most troubling question about COVID-19 has been whether the SARS-CoV-2 virus is something that has evolved naturally or a fiction created in the laboratory.
Subtly but intrinsically linked to that question, yet another debate has been going on for some time – whether the first COVID case was actually on 1st December 2019 as China claims or the virus is already in its own right. Not only in the country of origin but several continents, a few months before that.
The latest and loudest voice to raise that question is that of the United States House Foreign Affairs Committee minority employees. 84 page appendix In its September 2020 report on the origins of the virus.
Published earlier this month, the addendum sharply focuses on the possibility that SARS-CoV-2 may have reached countries such as Brazil, France and Italy through athletes from the World Military Games held in Wuhan in October 2019.
The document said that the Chinese government, despite knowing that a deadly virus was spreading, allowed the Games to be held. Even all efforts were made to keep it a secret.
The appendix comes after several other reports in scientific journals – some of them pre-print and some peer-reviewed, noting the presence of antibodies that are specific to SARS-CoV-2, made a similar point to the previous one. Make. Year.
The noise about Covid breaking Chinese borders, officially believed, adds a new dimension to the debate as it could mean that many people around the world died without even being diagnosed with their disease.
there is also persistent doubt that the SARS-CoV-2 virus is, in some ways, a beneficial product from a pathogen that infected six miners in China’s Yunnan province in 2012.
Read also: CDC report finds unvaccinated people 29 times more likely to be hospitalized with Covid
Case Study – Italy
A pre-print uploaded to the medRxiv site earlier this month states that as early as 3 September 2019 and 5 February 2020 from Italy’s Veneto region (one of the oldest and worst affected regions in the country) SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in samples taken from Lazio. Neutralizing antibodies were also found in Lazio samples.
Researchers from the Fondazione IRCCS Istituto Nazionale Tumori, Milan, wrote: “Beyond serological studies and computational genomic phylogenetic analyzes of the isolation of the SARS-CoV-2 viral genome in respiratory swabs of a symptomatic child recovered from suspected measles and skin Biopsy of a symptomatic woman with positive IgG Sars-CoV-2 antibody, later in November 2019 both in Milan strongly supports the initial, under superficial circulation of the virus.”
He continued: “These findings do not suggest exactly that the virus originated in Italy, but support the idea that the virus was spreading in China before the first known cases and that it may have been brought by travelers who had been introduced to China. Direct links were given with European and American countries, especially with the North West and East Italian regions, which are among the most industrialized and connected regions of Italy.
A similar claim was made in a paper earlier this year published in the magazine science direct The virus was in circulation before what has been recorded in Italy.
Scientists tested wastewater samples collected from five wastewater treatment plants (WWTPs) in three cities and regions in northern Italy (Milan in Lombardy, Turin in Piedmont and Bologna in Emilia-Romagna) between October 2019 and February 2020. did.
They informed of: “A total of 15 positive samples were confirmed by both the methods. The earliest dates to 18 December 2019 in Milan and Turin and 29 January 2020 in Bologna … Our results demonstrate that SARS-CoV-2 was already circulating in northern Italy at the end of 2019. “
Italy has strong business ties with Wuhan, which is also an apparel manufacturing hub, in addition to the presence of the now infamous Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). Many Italian fashion houses outsource manufacturing to the Asian nation.
An incidental discovery in Italy came from a lung cancer screening trial when researchers detected the presence of SARS-CoV-2 receptor-binding domain (RBD)-specific antibodies in blood samples from 959 asymptomatic individuals enrolled in the trial between September 2019 and March. saw. 2020.
SARS-CoV-2 RBD-specific antibodies were detected in 111 out of 959 (11.6 per cent) individuals, beginning in September 2019 (14 per cent), the cluster of positive cases in the second week of February (more than 30 per cent) with. 2020, and the highest number in Lombardy (53.2 percent).
“This study shows an unexpectedly very early spread of SARS-CoV-2 among asymptomatic individuals in Italy, several months before the first patient was identified, and clarifies the onset and spread of the coronavirus disease 2019 (Covid-19) epidemic. Is. Detection of SARS-CoV-2 antibodies in asymptomatic people prior to the outbreak of COVID-19 in Italy could reshape the history of the pandemic. informed of in the magazine tumor in November 2020.
Read also: There are many ‘dodgy journals’ in the WHO Covid database, 70 papers are from Indians
Military World Games 2019
Military World Games 2019 was held in Wuhan from 18 to 27 October 2019. The event is an Olympics for military athletes.
According to data collected by the House Foreign Affairs Committee, 9,308 athletes from 109 countries competed in 329 events. Twenty-five countries, including Russia, Brazil, France, Germany and Poland, sent athletes to the Games.
The report claims that several foreign athletes fell ill at the Games, recalls a Luxembourgish athlete asking how his temperature was taken upon arrival, and also quotes a Canadian participant as how he did in lockdown. Entered a city and suffered “fever, chills and vomiting”. and insomnia” 12 days after coming.
“On our flight to come home, 60 Canadian athletes on the flight were isolated [at the back of the plane] For a 12 hour flight. We were sick with symptoms ranging from cough to diarrhea and in-between,” the Canadian athlete is quoted in the report.
The report even goes as far as to say that this was actually the first “super spreader event”.
Case Study – France
The finding of the population-based CONSTANCES cohort in France (a representative nationwide cohort of 215,000 adults aged 18–69 years) also dates the spread of the SARS-CoV-2 virus to a much earlier date than now.
French scientists reported in european journal of epidemiology That the first documented case in Europe was detected retrospectively in the country in a patient with a diagnosis of pneumonia and a positive SARS-CoV-2 RT-PCR result on 27 December 2019. Serum samples are routinely collected from the CONSTANCES cohort.
“Using serum samples collected routinely in 9,144 adults from a French general population-based cohort, we identified 353 participants with a positive SARS-CoV-2 IgG test, of whom on 13 November 2019 and Samples were taken and confirmed between January 2020. neutralizing antibody test informed of in the same paper.
“Investigation in 11 of these participants revealed the experience of symptoms possibly related to conditions at risk for SARS-CoV-2 infection or potential SARS-CoV-2 exposure. This suggests an early spread of SARS-CoV-2 in Europe,” the scientists said.
Read also: COVID may enter endemic phase in India, says WHO Chief Scientist Soumya Swaminathan
Case Study – Brazil
Europe was not the only continent where SARS-CoV-2 was circulating in 2019. Scientists in Brazil tested wastewater samples in Santa Catarina from October 2019 to March 2020 to detect the virus.
in an article published in the last month science direct, the scientists reported: “Our findings suggest that SARS-CoV-2 was running undetected in the community in Brazil since November 2019, compared with the first reported case in the US (21 January 2020).”
Samples were first screened for the presence of the virus using RT-PCR and then each positive sample was re-examined at an independent laboratory for confirmation.
‘Hide, hide and destroy evidence’
This is what the Appendix to the House Committee report wrote in its findings: “It is the opinion of the Committee minority staff based on the primacy of the information available; the documented attempts to conceal, conceal, and destroy evidence; and the lack of material evidence to the contrary; that SARS-CoV-2 was accidentally released from the Wuhan Institute of Virology Laboratory sometime before September 12, 2019.”
It added: “The virus, which may be natural in origin or the result of genetic manipulation, was possibly collected between 2012 and 2015 in a cave identified in Yunnan Province, PRC. Its release has resulted in poor laboratory safety.” standards and practices, have been further exacerbated by hazardous gain-of-function research being conducted at inadequate biosafety levels, including BSL-2.
“The virus then spread throughout central Wuhan, possibly via the Wuhan subway, in the weeks before the Military World Games. Those sports became an international vector, causing the virus to spread to several continents around the world. “
(Edited by Amit Upadhyay)
Read also: India does not have enough data to decide on need for COVID booster shot: MHA expert panel
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