9 ms·

From what I've read it came from bats. Most probably bats being eaten.[1] Bats have been the source of at least 4 pandemics. It's interesting to note that curr

by sdiw 7y ago

From what I've read it came from bats. Most probably bats being eaten.[1] Bats have been the source of at least 4 pandemics. It's interesting to note that current coronavirus spreading in China and the SARS outbreak of 2003 have two things in common: Both are from the coronavirus family, and both were passed from animals to humans in a wet market.[2] I tried to put together a page for coronavirus in China here where I tried to gather all the information in one place in order for us to easily follow stuff (https://thestrife.co/wuhan-coronavirus-media-coverage https://thestrife.co/wuhan-coronavirus-media-coverage) and photos[3]. 1. https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/xgqy3n/scientists-now-think-they-know-what-started-chinas-deadly-coronavirus-bats https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/xgqy3n/scientists-now-thi... 2. https://www.businessinsider.in/science/news/experts-think-the-wuhan-coronavirus-jumped-from-bats-to-snakes-to-people-bats-have-been-the-source-of-at-least-4-pandemics-/articleshow/73569703.cms https://www.businessinsider.in/science/news/experts-think-th... 3. https://thestrife.co/wuhan-coronavirus-gallery https://thestrife.co/wuhan-coronavirus-gallery

ptenk 7y ago
I’ve read virology reports that the virus originated most likely from bats but through an intermediary source — as to which animal, that’s unknown. Another thing I’ve been pondering is since bats have been the source of deadly, infectious diseases in humans for so long, that’s where the historical myth of vampires and the living dead come from.
- monadic2 7y ago
  There’s plenty of actual research into the ancient origin of vampires you can read without resorting to baseless speculation. There is no single myth or origin and eastern europe has no vampire bats—in fact, the bats are named after the myth. The connection is likely due to them simply being nocturnal. EDIT: My tone came off as completely dismissing your thinking, which I don't mean to, I just mean to say that there's already a lot written on the topic.
  - sandworm101 7y ago
    Bat "bites" are only half the story. Bat scratches are really nasty. In ancient times they would look like bites and most always would become infected. Even today, in much of the world (ie usa) any contact with wild bat should be taken very seriously. The link between bats and disease is no myth.
    - jlmorton 7y ago
      Bats are also the common wild reservoir for lyssaviruses, like rabies. Bats are not highly susceptible to rabies, and can remain asymptomatic for long periods of time. If you wake up in a room with a bat in it, or if you find a bat in a room with a child, or otherwise disabled person, rabies post-exposure prophylaxis is called for, even if you don't find a scratch, or bite mark.
- droithomme 7y ago
  > the virus originated most likely from bats but through an intermediary source They don't mean another animal. They are hinting at the new Wuhan BSL-4 facility: https://www.nature.com/news/inside-the-chinese-lab-poised-to-study-world-s-most-dangerous-pathogens-1.21487 https://www.nature.com/news/inside-the-chinese-lab-poised-to...
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
chrisco255 7y ago
I've heard the bat eating theory, but the virus is airborne and infects the lungs. So it seems that eating a bat probably didn't cause this.
- 3fe9a03ccd14ca5 7y ago
  The act of eating the bat is plausible from people catching them (alive), storied then, preparing them, and people coming to an area where that happens to consume them.
- echelon 7y ago
  Method of transmission does not stop bats from being a reservoir for the virus. It was already capable of making the species jump (else it wouldn't), and could have further adapted to using other transmission routes once it got into humans. The long incubation time makes me think it takes awhile for the virus to get a foothold.
- deleted 7y ago
  [deleted]
- Fomite 7y ago
  There's plenty of potential transmission routes. For MERS, drinking camel milk, for example, was a pretty strong risk factor.
- Geee 7y ago
  It is a specific mutation of the virus, that is able to infect lungs and spread by making you sneeze. The mechanism that makes you sick is also the way to spread for the virus. People get viruses all the time from eating bats, but if it doesn't make you sneeze (or spread fluids in another way) it won't be infectious.
aclsid 7y ago
It was reported in the BBC today that while SARS originated in bats, the vector for humans were a species of cats that got the disease from the bats. For coronavirus what we know so far is that it originated in a seafood market, but as to what species was eaten that is speculation at this point.
- busymom0 7y ago
  Comparison between "Bat SARS-like coronavirus" and the "Wuhan seafood market pneumonia virus" seems to show a 100% match: https://blast.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Blast.cgi?RID=2PUA1EJK114&CMD=Get https://blast.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Blast.cgi?RID=2PUA1EJK114&CMD... Bat SARS-like coronavirus WIV1 has been known since at least 2013. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat_SARS-like_coronavirus_WIV1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat_SARS-like_coronavirus_WIV1
- trop 7y ago
  Not at all making light of it, but with the cats and the bats, my mind wanders to David Bowie's apocalyptic "Future Legend": "Fleas the size of rats sucked on rats the size of cats..." The lyrics actually speak to the sort of fear this elicits: "And in the death,/As the last few corpses lay rotting on the slimy/Thoroughfare ... And red, mutant, eyes gaze down on Hunger City."
- mkl 7y ago
  The vector was civets, which are not cats. See the evolutionary tree here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feliformia#Phylogenetic_tree https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feliformia#Phylogenetic_tree Felidae are cats, and Viverridae are civets (closer to hyenas and mongooses).
- Accujack 7y ago
  I've seen at least one report that says the first known patient (who is not necessarily the one who caught the disease from an animal) never visited the Wuhan market. Despite all the media stating it as fact, it's not certain where it came from yet, just likely.
slowmovintarget 7y ago
Not snakes? The first reports I read were about snakes.
- slowmovintarget 7y ago
  Disease passed from bats to snakes to humans: https://www.businessinsider.com/wuhan-coronavirus-sars-bats-animals-to-humans-2020-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/wuhan-coronavirus-sars-bats-...
Triesault 7y ago
The Vice article that is cited by sdiw doesn't mention that the virus came from "bats being eaten.[1]" The article does state "new report points to the original animal source: bats" but nothing about bats being eaten. Maybe I missed something, please let me know. :) The National Geographic article states the following: > "[T]he highest prevalence of coronaviruses tend to be extruded by animals through feces, or guano in the case of bats. Coronaviruses not only spread via the air and the respiratory tract, but also if fecal matter comes in contact with another creature’s mouth. Bats aren’t exactly clean, so if one nibbles on a fruit, the food may get contaminated with fecal matter. If the fruit drops to the ground, then it can serve as a viral crossover point for farmed animals like civets." [2] It seems more likely the virus jumped from the bat to another animal that ate something contaminated with bat guano infected with the virus. That animal was then traded at this market where the virus somehow spread to humans. This lead me to find the following Wikipedia article on Civets[3]. This mentions how Civets are farmed and fed coffee cherries then the partly digested coffee beans are harvested from the Civets fecal matter. This is purely speculation, but this could be one way that the virus could have spread to humans. A Civet ate a coffee cherry that an infected horseshoe bat had contaminated with guano infected with the virus. The Civet was traded at this market and the virus spread to humans. Once again, this is pure speculation on my part but it shows how there are other mechanisms in which the virus could spread to humans without someone 'eating bats'. [1] https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/xgqy3n/scientists-now-think-they-know-what-started-chinas-deadly-coronavirus-bats https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/xgqy3n/scientists-now-thi... [2] https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/01/new-coronavirus-spreading-between-humans-how-it-started/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/01/new-coron... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civet#Coffee https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civet#Coffee
- runawaybottle 7y ago
  Could be even simpler? Someone is going out and killing the bats right? They are physically handling dead bats in bulk, why can’t that be enough?
  - jkqwzsoo 7y ago
    > Could be even simpler? Someone is going out and killing the bats right? They are physically handling dead bats in bulk, why can’t that be enough? Because the specific claim was "most probably bats being eaten[1]" (not found in citation). The commenter above took an article which claims that the virus is linked to those found in bats, to "most probably" being caused by bats being eaten. That is the speculation/claim that is under dispute.
ngcc_hk 7y ago
Local news said it is eating bamboo rat.
qwerty456127 7y ago
Isn't the very fact people eat bats alarming? Who would eat bats voluntarily? They probably don't have much choice there.
- kibwen 7y ago
  The same could be said for plenty of meats, e.g. lobster ("who would eat these bottom-feeding saltwater cockroaches voluntarily?"). Different cultures can simply have different norms, and even where it's not normal, poor people will eat whatever is available and rich people will eat whatever is a curiosity.
- wsc981 7y ago
  In Asia people eat a lot of really weird stuff for us Westerners. I live in Thailand with my Thai girlfriend. I don't understand why my girlfriend likes to eat various kinds of insects and larva and why people in my village like to eat a pigs' brains. Yesterday my girlfriend showed me a YouTube movie of a Chinese girl eating a live octopus. I also know some people like to eat snakes around here. Different strokes for different folks and all that.
  - chx 7y ago
    There's a ragout made from lungs (Beuschel) that is enjoyed in the former Austro-Hungarian empire area and absolutely nowhere else. If you want to try it, the best can be had at the Meierei, just don't forget to reserve a seat a few weeks ahead especially if your lunch aligns with the strudel time, the place is packed to the gills then.
    - bmn__ 7y ago
      > that is enjoyed in the former Austro-Hungarian empire area and absolutely nowhere else Nonsense, that's Austrian exceptionalism at its worst. All across Europe the dish (English speaking locales: "calf's lights") can be had in a minority of restaurants and also is occasionally cooked at home.
  - exdsq 7y ago
samstave 7y ago
You might like this: https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6 https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.h... https://i.imgur.com/FUwsbBM.png https://i.imgur.com/FUwsbBM.png
cjbprime 7y ago
I think you might be confused about "bats being eaten". A theory on SARS is that it was spread by bats eating fruit, leaving guano on it, civets eat the guano-laced fruit, people eat the civets. Just because bats are an important part of the vector doesn't mean that people are eating them directly. I haven't seen anyone claim, for example, that live bats were actually sold at the Wuhan wet markets. But civets are, illegally.
- daodedickinson 7y ago
  https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7927747/Asian-man-dips-baby-mouse-bowl-sauce-eating-ALIVE.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7927747/Asian-man-d...
  - p1necone 7y ago
    The daily mail is not a reliable source. Especially not for anything involving foreigners.
- mc32 7y ago
  Perhaps, but nevertheless the CCP gov had a media star apologize for “popularizing” eating bat soup.
cannabis_sam 7y ago
Here’s the research claiming that SARS jumped from horseshoe bats to civets to humans: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1236580/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1236580/

by sdiw 7y ago

ptenk 7y ago

I’ve read virology reports that the virus originated most likely from bats but through an intermediary source — as to which animal, that’s unknown. Another thing I’ve been pondering is since bats have been the source of deadly, infectious diseases in humans for so long, that’s where the historical myth of vampires and the living dead come from.

monadic2 7y ago
There’s plenty of actual research into the ancient origin of vampires you can read without resorting to baseless speculation. There is no single myth or origin and eastern europe has no vampire bats—in fact, the bats are named after the myth. The connection is likely due to them simply being nocturnal. EDIT: My tone came off as completely dismissing your thinking, which I don't mean to, I just mean to say that there's already a lot written on the topic.
- sandworm101 7y ago
  Bat "bites" are only half the story. Bat scratches are really nasty. In ancient times they would look like bites and most always would become infected. Even today, in much of the world (ie usa) any contact with wild bat should be taken very seriously. The link between bats and disease is no myth.
  - jlmorton 7y ago
    Bats are also the common wild reservoir for lyssaviruses, like rabies. Bats are not highly susceptible to rabies, and can remain asymptomatic for long periods of time. If you wake up in a room with a bat in it, or if you find a bat in a room with a child, or otherwise disabled person, rabies post-exposure prophylaxis is called for, even if you don't find a scratch, or bite mark.
droithomme 7y ago
> the virus originated most likely from bats but through an intermediary source They don't mean another animal. They are hinting at the new Wuhan BSL-4 facility: https://www.nature.com/news/inside-the-chinese-lab-poised-to-study-world-s-most-dangerous-pathogens-1.21487 https://www.nature.com/news/inside-the-chinese-lab-poised-to...
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]

chrisco255 7y ago

I've heard the bat eating theory, but the virus is airborne and infects the lungs. So it seems that eating a bat probably didn't cause this.

3fe9a03ccd14ca5 7y ago
The act of eating the bat is plausible from people catching them (alive), storied then, preparing them, and people coming to an area where that happens to consume them.
echelon 7y ago
Method of transmission does not stop bats from being a reservoir for the virus. It was already capable of making the species jump (else it wouldn't), and could have further adapted to using other transmission routes once it got into humans. The long incubation time makes me think it takes awhile for the virus to get a foothold.
deleted 7y ago
[deleted]
Fomite 7y ago
There's plenty of potential transmission routes. For MERS, drinking camel milk, for example, was a pretty strong risk factor.
Geee 7y ago
It is a specific mutation of the virus, that is able to infect lungs and spread by making you sneeze. The mechanism that makes you sick is also the way to spread for the virus. People get viruses all the time from eating bats, but if it doesn't make you sneeze (or spread fluids in another way) it won't be infectious.

aclsid 7y ago

It was reported in the BBC today that while SARS originated in bats, the vector for humans were a species of cats that got the disease from the bats. For coronavirus what we know so far is that it originated in a seafood market, but as to what species was eaten that is speculation at this point.

busymom0 7y ago
Comparison between "Bat SARS-like coronavirus" and the "Wuhan seafood market pneumonia virus" seems to show a 100% match: https://blast.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Blast.cgi?RID=2PUA1EJK114&CMD=Get https://blast.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/Blast.cgi?RID=2PUA1EJK114&CMD... Bat SARS-like coronavirus WIV1 has been known since at least 2013. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat_SARS-like_coronavirus_WIV1 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bat_SARS-like_coronavirus_WIV1
trop 7y ago
Not at all making light of it, but with the cats and the bats, my mind wanders to David Bowie's apocalyptic "Future Legend": "Fleas the size of rats sucked on rats the size of cats..." The lyrics actually speak to the sort of fear this elicits: "And in the death,/As the last few corpses lay rotting on the slimy/Thoroughfare ... And red, mutant, eyes gaze down on Hunger City."
mkl 7y ago
The vector was civets, which are not cats. See the evolutionary tree here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feliformia#Phylogenetic_tree https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Feliformia#Phylogenetic_tree Felidae are cats, and Viverridae are civets (closer to hyenas and mongooses).
Accujack 7y ago
I've seen at least one report that says the first known patient (who is not necessarily the one who caught the disease from an animal) never visited the Wuhan market. Despite all the media stating it as fact, it's not certain where it came from yet, just likely.

slowmovintarget 7y ago

Not snakes? The first reports I read were about snakes.

slowmovintarget 7y ago
Disease passed from bats to snakes to humans: https://www.businessinsider.com/wuhan-coronavirus-sars-bats-animals-to-humans-2020-1 https://www.businessinsider.com/wuhan-coronavirus-sars-bats-...

Triesault 7y ago

The Vice article that is cited by sdiw doesn't mention that the virus came from "bats being eaten.[1]" The article does state "new report points to the original animal source: bats" but nothing about bats being eaten. Maybe I missed something, please let me know. :) The National Geographic article states the following: > "[T]he highest prevalence of coronaviruses tend to be extruded by animals through feces, or guano in the case of bats. Coronaviruses not only spread via the air and the respiratory tract, but also if fecal matter comes in contact with another creature’s mouth. Bats aren’t exactly clean, so if one nibbles on a fruit, the food may get contaminated with fecal matter. If the fruit drops to the ground, then it can serve as a viral crossover point for farmed animals like civets." [2] It seems more likely the virus jumped from the bat to another animal that ate something contaminated with bat guano infected with the virus. That animal was then traded at this market where the virus somehow spread to humans. This lead me to find the following Wikipedia article on Civets[3]. This mentions how Civets are farmed and fed coffee cherries then the partly digested coffee beans are harvested from the Civets fecal matter. This is purely speculation, but this could be one way that the virus could have spread to humans. A Civet ate a coffee cherry that an infected horseshoe bat had contaminated with guano infected with the virus. The Civet was traded at this market and the virus spread to humans. Once again, this is pure speculation on my part but it shows how there are other mechanisms in which the virus could spread to humans without someone 'eating bats'. [1] https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/xgqy3n/scientists-now-think-they-know-what-started-chinas-deadly-coronavirus-bats https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/xgqy3n/scientists-now-thi... [2] https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/01/new-coronavirus-spreading-between-humans-how-it-started/ https://www.nationalgeographic.com/science/2020/01/new-coron... [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civet#Coffee https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Civet#Coffee

runawaybottle 7y ago
Could be even simpler? Someone is going out and killing the bats right? They are physically handling dead bats in bulk, why can’t that be enough?
- jkqwzsoo 7y ago
  > Could be even simpler? Someone is going out and killing the bats right? They are physically handling dead bats in bulk, why can’t that be enough? Because the specific claim was "most probably bats being eaten[1]" (not found in citation). The commenter above took an article which claims that the virus is linked to those found in bats, to "most probably" being caused by bats being eaten. That is the speculation/claim that is under dispute.

ngcc_hk 7y ago

Local news said it is eating bamboo rat.

qwerty456127 7y ago

Isn't the very fact people eat bats alarming? Who would eat bats voluntarily? They probably don't have much choice there.

kibwen 7y ago
The same could be said for plenty of meats, e.g. lobster ("who would eat these bottom-feeding saltwater cockroaches voluntarily?"). Different cultures can simply have different norms, and even where it's not normal, poor people will eat whatever is available and rich people will eat whatever is a curiosity.
wsc981 7y ago
In Asia people eat a lot of really weird stuff for us Westerners. I live in Thailand with my Thai girlfriend. I don't understand why my girlfriend likes to eat various kinds of insects and larva and why people in my village like to eat a pigs' brains. Yesterday my girlfriend showed me a YouTube movie of a Chinese girl eating a live octopus. I also know some people like to eat snakes around here. Different strokes for different folks and all that.
- chx 7y ago
  There's a ragout made from lungs (Beuschel) that is enjoyed in the former Austro-Hungarian empire area and absolutely nowhere else. If you want to try it, the best can be had at the Meierei, just don't forget to reserve a seat a few weeks ahead especially if your lunch aligns with the strudel time, the place is packed to the gills then.
  - bmn__ 7y ago
    > that is enjoyed in the former Austro-Hungarian empire area and absolutely nowhere else Nonsense, that's Austrian exceptionalism at its worst. All across Europe the dish (English speaking locales: "calf's lights") can be had in a minority of restaurants and also is occasionally cooked at home.
- exdsq 7y ago

samstave 7y ago

You might like this: https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.html#/bda7594740fd40299423467b48e9ecf6 https://gisanddata.maps.arcgis.com/apps/opsdashboard/index.h... https://i.imgur.com/FUwsbBM.png https://i.imgur.com/FUwsbBM.png

cjbprime 7y ago

I think you might be confused about "bats being eaten". A theory on SARS is that it was spread by bats eating fruit, leaving guano on it, civets eat the guano-laced fruit, people eat the civets. Just because bats are an important part of the vector doesn't mean that people are eating them directly. I haven't seen anyone claim, for example, that live bats were actually sold at the Wuhan wet markets. But civets are, illegally.

daodedickinson 7y ago
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7927747/Asian-man-dips-baby-mouse-bowl-sauce-eating-ALIVE.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-7927747/Asian-man-d...
- p1necone 7y ago
  The daily mail is not a reliable source. Especially not for anything involving foreigners.
mc32 7y ago
Perhaps, but nevertheless the CCP gov had a media star apologize for “popularizing” eating bat soup.

cannabis_sam 7y ago

Here’s the research claiming that SARS jumped from horseshoe bats to civets to humans: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1236580/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1236580/