The chief investigator for the WHO mission, Peter Ben Embarek, said in an extensive interview with CNN that the mission found several signs of wider distribution in 2019, including that for the first time more than a dozen tribes of the virus in Wuhan already in December. The team also had the chance to speak to the first patient who Chinese officials said was infected. An office worker in his forties, without any travel history, reported on December 8th.
The slow rise of more detailed data gathered on the WHO’s long-awaited trip to China may contribute to concerns expressed by other scientists about the origin of the disease it spread in China long before its first official rise in the middle of December.
Embarek, who had just returned from Wuhan to Switzerland, told CNN: “The virus spread widely in Wuhan in December, which is a new finding.”
The WHO food safety specialist added that in December 2019, Chinese scientists presented 174 cases of coronavirus in and around Wuhan. Of these, 100 were confirmed by laboratory tests, and another 74 by the clinical diagnosis of the patient symptoms.
Embarek said it was possible that this larger number – probably serious cases noticed earlier by Chinese doctors – could have meant that the disease would have affected about 1,000 people in Wuhan in December.
“We haven’t done any modeling of it since,” he said. “But we know … in large numbers … out of the infected population, about 15% end up with serious cases, and the vast majority are mild cases.”
Embarek said the mission – which consists of 17 WHO scientists and 17 Chinese – increased the type of viral genetic material they examined from the first case of coronavirus in early December. This enabled them to look at partial genetic samples, rather than just complete samples, he said. As a result, they were able to collect 13 different genetic sequences of the SARS-COV-2 virus for the first time from December 2019. The sequences, if examined with broader patient data in China across 2019, could provide valuable clues about the geography. and timing of the outbreak before December.
Embarek said: “Some of them come from the markets … Some of them are not linked to the markets,” which includes the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, which presumably played a role in the first distribution of the virus. “It’s something we found as part of our mission … part of the interaction we all had.”
Variants ask bigger questions
Changes in the genetic makeup of a virus are common and usually harmless, and occur over time as the disease spreads between humans or animals. Before December, Embarek did not want to draw conclusions about what the 13 tribes could mean for the history of the disease.
But the discovery of as many different possible variants of the virus may indicate that it was in circulation for longer than just that month, as some virologists have previously suggested. This genetic material is probably the first physical evidence that has emerged internationally to reinforce such a theory.
Prof. Edward Holmes, a virologist at the University of Sydney, Australia, said: ‘As there has already been genetic diversity in SARS-CoV-2 series sampled from Wuhan in December 2019, it is likely that the virus is a was in circulation for a long time. longer than that month alone. ‘
Holmes, who has thoroughly studied the rise of the virus, said that these 13 series could indicate the spread of the virus for some time before the outbreak in Wuhan in December. “These data are in line with other analyzes that the virus originated in the human population earlier than December 2019 and that there was a period of cryptic transmission before it was first detected in the Huanan market.”
The WTO team held a three-hour press conference with their Chinese counterparts in Wuhan to present their findings last week. Since then, more and more details have emerged about the exact data to which they – and sometimes did not – have access.
Embarek said the mission through October and November 2019 was analyzed by Chinese scientists of 92 suspected Covid-19 cases – patients who had Covid-like symptoms and were seriously ill. The WHO team has requested that these 92 be tested for antibodies in January this year. Of these, 67 agree to be tested and all appear to be negative, Embarek said. He added that further tests are needed as it remains unclear if antibodies remain in former Covid-19 patients a year later.
The manner in which these 92 cases were spread over the two months and geographically across Hubei also interested Embarek, he said. Embarek said the 92, which was submitted to the WTO team, did not emerge in bunches, as is common in disease outbreaks. Instead, they were distributed in small numbers in both months and throughout the province of Hubei, where Wuhan is located.
“There was no grouping in specific places,” he said. “It would have been picked up.” It remains unclear whether these 92 cases were linked to coronavirus, and what may indicate this lack of clustering.
Embarek also said the mission was able to meet the first Covid-19 patient that China said he knew about. The man, a resident of Wuhan in his 40s, was not identified and had no recent travel history.
“He has no link to the markets,” Embarek said. “We also talked to him. He has a very – in a way – a dull and normal life, no walking in the mountains kind of thing. He was an office worker in a private company.”
China promises cooperation
China has promised transparency with the WHO inquiry. The US Embassy in Washington DC responded to US criticism that it should provide access to its previously unprocessed data, saying: “What the US has done in recent years has seriously undermined multilateral institutions, including the WHO, and international cooperation on COVID seriously damaged. 19, ” a spokesman for the Chinese Embassy in the United States said in the statement.
“But the US, acting as if none of this has ever happened, is pointing fingers at other countries that are faithfully supporting the WHO and the WHO itself,” the statement added.
The WHO team hopes to return to Wuhan months later to continue their investigation, Embarek said, although he could not provide concrete dates for a confirmed trip.
He said the team was hoping to urgently investigate biological samples that, according to experts, were not available on this first trip, specifically thousands of samples from Wuhan’s blood donor bank that is two years old.
“There are about 200,000 samples available that are now secure and that can be used for a new series of studies,” Embarek said. ‘It would be great if we could [work] with that. ”
Embarek said there could be technical problems accessing these samples. “We understand that these samples are extremely small samples and are only used for litigation,” he said. “There is no mechanism to enable routine studies with these types of samples.”
He said some other biological test specimens that could have been useful during the Wuhan mission were also unavailable to them. “Many of the samples were discarded after a few months or weeks, depending on the purpose for which they were taken,” he said.
Embarek said the mission’s circumstances – from intense quarantine periods and social distance – led to frustrations, along with the worldwide investigation of the behavior and its findings.
“We worked closely for a month between two groups of a large group of scientists,” he said. ‘And of course, it’s time and time again … you – as always between passionate scientists – get one heated discussion and then argumentation about this and that.
“Remember, we had the whole planet on our shoulders 24 hours a month, which does not facilitate the work among scientists.”