A group of scientists from Shandong University in China have discovered 24 coronavirus genomes in bats, according to a study published in the journal Cell.
Experts studied the saliva and waste products of 23 different species of bats (more than 300 individuals in total) that lived in Yunnan province in southern China, collected between May 2019 and November 2020. Of the genomes they found, four turned out to be similar to the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which causes coronavirus infection.
According to scientists, one of the new coronaviruses, a sample called RpYN06 found in a horseshoe bat (Rhinolophus cornutus), is genetically very similar to SARS-CoV-2, with the exception of differences in the spike protein, a structure that the virus uses when attaching to cells …
According to scientists, a virus similar to SARS-CoV-2 was detected in Thailand last year. The data obtained indicate that “viruses closely related to SARS-CoV-2 continue to circulate in bat populations, and in some regions may occur with a relatively high frequency,” the CNN experts concluded.
The virus, whose genome closely resembles SARS-CoV-2, has also been found in biomaterials from bats in Japan collected over seven years ago. According to scientists at the University of Tokyo, it is not able to be transmitted to humans.
In February, a group of scientists from the University of Cambridge, the Potsdam Institute for the Study of Climate Change and the University of Hawaii concluded that climate change in southern China increased the number and species diversity of bats in the region, which contributed to the formation of new types of coronaviruses, including those dangerous to humans. …
In early 2021, an international mission of experts from the World Health Organization (WHO) investigated the origin of the causative agent of coronavirus infection in Wuhan, China. In a report following the trip, the organization presented four versions of the appearance of SARS-CoV-2. The authors consider the most likely version of the transmission of coronavirus to humans from bats through an intermediary animal. At the same time, the version of the leakage of the virus from the laboratory in Wuhan in the WHO was called “extremely unlikely.” However, the intelligence services of Western countries, including the United States and Britain, consider it plausible.
