scorecardresearch
Friday, March 29, 2024
Support Our Journalism
HomeHealthTime running out to study Covid origins, WHO scientists warn as they...

Time running out to study Covid origins, WHO scientists warn as they lay out 6 priorities

Scientists from WHO-China team, tasked with studying origins of Covid, said unidentified animal hosts and early human infections have to be traced immediately because of waning antibodies.

Follow Us :
Text Size:

Bengaluru: Members of the joint World Health Organization (WHO)-China team, which is tasked with determining the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, are urging world leaders and the scientific community to expedite the follow-up research needed to understand where the virus came from.

The team of scientists had earlier published a report in March, after their visit to Wuhan, and concluded that the origins of the coronavirus are most likely to be natural transmission from animals.

However, in a commentary piece in the journal Nature Wednesday, the team said that their March report was “meant to be the first step in a process that has stalled”.

The authors laid out six priorities going forward to rapidly determine the origins of the virus, warning that understanding the origins is a global priority and any further delay will render potentially important biological studies impossible. This is because the SARS-CoV-2 virus antibodies will wane in undiscovered infected animals and earliest undetected human cases.


Also read: Unvaccinated people 29 times more likely to be hospitalised with Covid, CDC report finds


‘Time is running out’

In their commentary piece, scientists noted that since antibodies waned, collecting crucial blood samples from animals and early human infections is urgent, and the window for this is closing rapidly.

To continue with the second phase of global studies into the origins of the pandemic, the team recommends six priorities.

These include additional tracing studies looking for early Covid cases globally, performing antibody surveys to identify places where the cases were never caught among individuals, community surveys that will trace the route that supplied animals took to reach the markets in Wuhan before human cases were identified, studies and assessments of wild bats and other potential natural reservoirs or intermediate hosts of the virus in and around China, detailed analysis of all earlier cases and following up on new leads.

The researchers also said that the origin search is at a “critical juncture” and the biological feasibility of conducting traceback studies is decreasing with each passing day.

To avoid this, the scientists asked the scientific community and world leaders to come together and expedite the next phase of research “while there is still time”.


Also read: Covid in India may be entering endemic stage, WHO chief scientist Soumya Swaminathan says


Original mission and international response

In their piece, the scientists also outlined the original plan of their 28-day mission to China in January 2021: Retrospective studies of respiratory illness in the community in 2019, review of patient files and death certificates, reconstruction of the early outbreak, mapping and tracing the supply chain of products that came to the Hunan seafood market, testing a range of animals including livestock, pets and wildlife, and analysis and review of published and unpublished viral genomic data.

The team stated that there was consensus that the virus was circulating in Wuhan in December 2019 and that there was a strong link between the market and the early part of the pandemic in China.

The authors acknowledged that some raw data required from China has not been shared by the Chinese team citing patient confidentiality in 174 cases but the team concluded that they were not likely the first or earliest set of infections.

They further noted that while the lab-leak hypothesis was not a part of their original mission, they felt it was too important to ignore.

While their investigations concluded a likely animal origin, the scientists also said that there was no definitive proof for or against four proposed pathways of transmission — natural zoonotic spillover from wild animals, zoonotic transmission from handling farmed animals, zoonotic transmission by consuming contaminated food and the lab-leak route.

The authors wrote, at length, about the nature of their investigation, the subsequent criticisms and media coverage of the report, and commentary around their work in China.

According to them, before the report was released in March, some governments had already sent formal statements to the WHO stating that China had not shared adequate data with the world, enough attention wasn’t being given to the lab-leak theory or that China’s international politics played a role in the conclusions.

They defended their investigation, noting that “frank discussions” were held with key scientists in Wuhan and examining all the evidence led the team to conclude that there were no leads to follow up to determine if the virus leaked from a lab.

The researchers cited a number of reports that came up subsequent to their publication in March, of newer data that backed the lab-leak hypothesis.

They then provided an explanation for why each of those cases lack enough data to provide a lead for a lab-leak hypothesis and also asked these study authors to submit any supporting data with the WHO.


Also read: 3rd wave could be worse than 2nd if vaccinations don’t pick up, bring 6L cases/day, govt warned


 

Subscribe to our channels on YouTube, Telegram & WhatsApp

Support Our Journalism

India needs fair, non-hyphenated and questioning journalism, packed with on-ground reporting. ThePrint – with exceptional reporters, columnists and editors – is doing just that.

Sustaining this needs support from wonderful readers like you.

Whether you live in India or overseas, you can take a paid subscription by clicking here.

Support Our Journalism

LEAVE A REPLY

Please enter your comment!
Please enter your name here

Most Popular