Slack / Private Message Drop — page 978

With SARS-CoV, I think there's a compelling case that the virus went from bats>other species>eventually to civets>humans. This is the argument that the sequence makes. Do you think that argument is misguided because of the quasispecies and metapopulation? On Jul 8, 2021, at 5:55 PM, Frutos .fr> wrote: [EXTERNAL EMAIL] Jon, No. it is not possible. It is a quasispecies evolution. Human viruses exist only in humans. SARS-CoV-2 is just one of the multiple human avatars of the SARS metapopulation. SARS-CoV is another one. Both have emerged by chance. Many haven't. SARS-CoV-3 is perhaps already evolving in humans but we will know it only after its emergence. Viruses from the same metapopulation will evolve differently depending on the host species. Put a human virus in another host, the sequence will change. In animals you will find cousins and none of them will be the ancestor. Ancestors have already disappeared a long time ago. It is an endless process of circulation and evolution. Best Roger Le 09/07/2021 à 02:42, Jon Cohen a écrit : Roger, Thanks for the thorough explanation. I understand your point about surveillance to prevent outbreaks, but how about now, once the outbreak has surfaced? Couldn't surveillance of wild animals potentially lead to a clue as to which animals harbored a closer relative than RaTG13? Jon On Jul 8, 2021, at 5:21 PM, Frutos .fr> wrote: [EXTERNAL EMAIL] Hi Jon, No, it won't help at all. 1) We can do surveillance only on things we know. By definition, the causative agent of a novel emerging disease is not known. It is known only after the disease has been characterized and the causative agent has been isolated. The novel disease is detected and characterized only when physicians see a lot of people coming at the same time with atypical symptoms. This is exactly what happened with SARS-CoV-2/COVID-19. Far too late to do any surveillance. 2) The pandemic virus does not exist yet in the wild. It only evolves in humans following the primo infection (primary case - first human to be infected by the pathogen). Looking for the pandemic virus in the wild is hunting for unicorns, for things that don't exist. The emergence of a disease is an accident and the emerging virus is only one out of a