12 years before the COVID-19 pandemic began, scientists warned, in a study published by Clinical Microbiology Reviews in 2007, that the situation in China was a “time bomb” for a dangerous virus outbreak. Their cause for concern was due to the culture of eating exotic mammals in southern China, with the crowded wet markets packed with wild game and lacking biosecurity, and the common presence of SARS-CoV-like viruses in horseshoe bats, in combination with the well-known ability of coronaviruses to undergo genetic recombination.
They said:
Coronaviruses are well known to undergo genetic recombination, which may lead to new genotypes and outbreaks. The presence of a large reservoir of SARS-CoV-like viruses in horseshoe bats, together with the culture of eating exotic mammals in southern China, is a time bomb. The possibility of the reemergence of SARS and other novel viruses from animals or laboratories and therefore the need for preparedness should not be ignored.
Another key quote comes from the introduction:
The small reemergence of SARS in late 2003 after the resumption of the wildlife market in southern China and the recent discovery of a very similar virus in horseshoe bats, bat SARS-CoV, suggested that SARS can return if conditions are fit for the introduction, mutation, amplification, and transmission of this dangerous virus.
The study was called “Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus as an Agent of Emerging and Reemerging Infection” and it was published in October 2007 by Clinical Microbiology Reviews, a journal by the American Society for Microbiology. You can access the full study here.
Reference: “Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus as an Agent of Emerging and Reemerging Infection” by Vincent C. C. Cheng, Susanna K. P. Lau, Patrick C. Y. Woo and Kwok Yung Yuen, 12 October 2007, Clinical Microbiology Reviews.
DOI: 10.1128/CMR.00023-07
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12 Comments
The American public has been ‘warned’ that most of us carry latent HIV, so that means in 20 years or so, we should have done something because we were warned?
There now exists a polio epidemic specifically because of the use of vaccines.
Where is there a polio epidemic? I grew up in the 1950s before there was a vaccine against polio. I went to school with kids dragging around heavy leg braces who had had it. Swimming pools were closed in the summertime. People lived in terror of polio. We were inoculated with the Salk vaccine in school and later, my entire family received the Sabin oral vaccine. You sound like an “antivaxxer” and you should know that your position is scientifically invalid and dangerous.
Let me give some facts to your statement. And, by the way, if your population had been immunized appropriately, they would not be having this ‘polio epidemic.’
Oral polio vaccine (OPV) contains an attenuated (weakened) vaccine-virus, activating an immune response in the body. When a child is immunized with OPV, the weakened vaccine-virus replicates in the intestine for a limited period, thereby developing immunity by building up antibodies. During this time, the vaccine-virus is also excreted. In areas of inadequate sanitation, this excreted vaccine-virus can spread in the immediate community (and this can offer protection to other children through ‘passive’ immunization), before eventually dying out.
On rare occasions, if a population is seriously under-immunized, an excreted vaccine-virus can continue to circulate for an extended period of time. The longer it is allowed to survive, the more genetic changes it undergoes. In very rare instances, the vaccine-virus can genetically change into a form that can paralyse – this is what is known as a circulating vaccine-derived poliovirus (cVDPV).
It takes a long time for a cVDPV to occur. Generally, the strain will have been allowed to circulate in an un- or under-immunized population for a period of at least 12 months. Circulating VDPVs occur when routine or supplementary immunization activities (SIAs) are poorly conducted and a population is left susceptible to poliovirus, whether from vaccine-derived or wild poliovirus. Hence, the problem is not with the vaccine itself, but low vaccination coverage. If a population is fully immunized, they will be protected against both vaccine-derived and wild polioviruses.
Since 2000, more than 10 billion doses of OPV have been administered to nearly 3 billion children worldwide. As a result, more than 13 million cases of polio have been prevented, and the disease has been reduced by more than 99%. During that time, 24 cVDPV outbreaks occurred in 21 countries, resulting in fewer than 760 VDPV cases.
Until 2015, over 90% of cVDPV cases were due to the type 2 component in OPV. With the transmission of wild poliovirus type 2 already successfully interrupted since 1999, in April 2016 a switch was implemented from trivalent OPV to bivalent OPV in routine immunization programmes. The removal of the type 2 component of OPV is associated with significant public health benefits, including a reduction of the risk of cases of cVDPV2.
The small risk of cVDPVs pales in significance to the tremendous public health benefits associated with OPV. Every year, hundreds of thousands of cases due to wild polio virus are prevented. Well over 10 million cases have been averted since large-scale administration of OPV began 20 years ago.
Circulating VDPVs in the past have been rapidly stopped with 2–3 rounds of high-quality immunization campaigns. The solution is the same for all polio outbreaks: immunize every child several times with the oral vaccine to stop polio transmission, regardless of the origin of the virus.
Reference
World Health Organization. (April 2017). What is vaccine derived polio? Global Polio Eradication Initiative. Retrieved from https://www.who.int/features/qa/64/en/
Kate – state your source. My mom, an RN lived though the polio epidemic. The polio vaccine, developed by Dr. Jonas Salk SAVED LIVES!
Freaking Scientologist you’re going to kill us all with your stupid freaking belief system. Vaccines rarely kill, but they sure do save lives.
Please can you tell me what stupid freaking belief systems are held by Scientoligists?
they believe in scientology, created by a science fiction writer.
The core belief says that a human is an immortal, spiritual being (thetan) that is resident in a physical body. The thetan has had innumerable past lives and it is observed in advanced Scientology texts that lives preceding the thetan’s arrival on Earth were lived in extraterrestrial cultures.
Infections from the poliovirus only increased in Pakistan and Afghanistan where, the vaccine is delivered to less than 75% of the at-risk population. There are inherent challenges in the delivery of the vaccine to remote populations and, it does not help when there are people forwarding the anti-vax narrative.
Vaccines save lives.
Of course, they mentioned southern China in both the conclusion and the introduction quotes you cite, and Wuhan is in central China, about 1,000 KM away from Guangdong, where the original SARS outbreak occurred. In short, they said southern China–not China.
It seems to me (read: wikipedia) that places in China is either considered northern or southern. Northern China (Chinese: 中国北方 or 中国北部; literally: ‘China’s North’) and southern China (Chinese: 中国南方 or 中国南部; literally: ‘China’s South’),[note 1] are two approximate mega-regions within China. The exact boundary between these two regions is not precisely defined. Nevertheless, the self-perception of Chinese nation, especially regional stereotypes, has often been dominated by these two concepts, given that regional differences in culture and language have historically fostered strong regional identities of the Chinese people.
Virginia and Florida (USA) are both considered “southern” and are about 1000km apart.
Not sure what your point is. Sounds like no one should be eating bats regardless of whether one lives in the southern US or southern china.
CCP must pay us for China Virus, they lied!
The bats will survive and the wet markets will thrive…