Novel coronavirus outbreak could have begun as early as 6 October 2019: New study

Study pegs date of the ‘most recent common ancestor’ of worldwide coronavirus strains between 6 October and 11 December, earlier than what China acknowledges.

Representational image for the novel coronavirus test | Photo: PTI

New Delhi: The novel coronavirus outbreak could have begun in October 2019, a new genetic study conducted by researchers at University College London’s Genetics Institute and the University of Reunion Island has shown.

The pathogen, formally known as the SARS-CoV-2, seems to have jumped from its initial animal host to humans sometime between 6 October and 11 December, the study has found.

The finding contradicts the claims of China, where the virus is thought to have originated. China had acknowledged that it found a new strain of coronavirus only on 7 January 2020.

The study also suggests that the virus has been mutating, and countries hit hardest by it show a large genetic diversity in it.

“All viruses naturally mutate. Mutations in themselves are not a bad thing and there is nothing to suggest SARS-CoV-2 is mutating faster or slower than expected. So far, we cannot say whether SARS-CoV-2 is becoming more or less lethal and contagious,” said Francois Balloux, co-leader of the research.

The researchers made their findings public Tuesday, and the study is set to be published in the upcoming edition of the scientific journal Infections, Genetics, and Evolution.

Most recent common ancestor

The research was carried out by studying 7,710 genome sequence assemblies from all over the world, and then examining the evolution of mutations. In this way, the researchers were able to trace a starting point for when the virus jumped to humans.

While the study showed that there were variations in the “mutations and evolutionary stages of the virus”, it succeeded in identifying the most recent common ancestor, which has led them to the conclusion that the virus originated between 6 October and 11 December 2019.

“These dates for the start of the epidemic are in broad agreement with previous estimates performed on smaller subsets of the Covid-19 genomic data, using various computational methods, though they should still be taken with some caution,” the researchers noted.

The study was also able to identify several mutations of the novel coronavirus since it has jumped to humans.

When the researchers looked at samples from countries such as the US, the UK, and Ireland, they found substantial diversity in them, suggesting that “local epidemics came from independent introduction of the virus”.

“The genomic diversity of the global SARS-CoV-2 population being recapitulated in multiple countries points to extensive worldwide transmission of Covid-19, likely from extremely early on in the pandemic,” it noted.