In China, an epic bat hunt for the origin of SARS led to a remote cave in
Yunnan, a cave that Chinese scientists claim to be the place with “all the
necessary building blocks for SARS” upon sequencing of 15 viral strains. This
is a virus that led to a 2002 outbreak, resulting in approximately 800 deaths
worldwide. To date, there have been no reported cases of SARS-CoV worldwide
since 2004. In this particular cave, the Chinese scientists found no strain
that was identical with the SARS virus itself, but the high mixing of strains
in the caves between the bats could potentially yield another virus strain that
is infectious to humans. The way that the bats were monitored included taking
guano samples and anal swabs for a period of five years. This cave is approximately 1kilometer away
from the nearest village Guangdong but in 2002 there were cases of SARS around 1,000km
away from Guangdong, so how exactly did the bats travel 1,000 kilometers when
the first outbreak of SARS occurred in 2002?
Well, the bats themselves do not have to travel 1,000 kilometers themselves, although they theoretically could, but the particular bat species
of interest are also suspected of infecting masked palm civets. These civets,
the Chinese scientists found, are sold in Guangdong animal markets, and in some
instances contained strains that shared some genetic similarity to that of SARS
strains although they lacked the genes necessary to latch on to and infect
human cells. Thus, this mode of transmission explains how the SARS outbreak of
2002 could have possibly begun, although confirmation in lab, where infection
from bat to civet is confirmed, would be highly informative.
As for now, the Chinese scientists will continue to keep a close eye on
these bat populations, and will continue to research the virus strains present
in the caves extensively.
Sources:
-Daniel Gutierrez
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