As to the coronavirus origin, whether it is an outbreak in the U.S. or in the Chinese city of Wuhan, there are now 500 to 600 cases of COVID-19 of it, in Washington State. The virus is marching to cause more cases.
As coronavirus spreads around the globe resulting into the increase of infected people and death tolls, medical experts are still wondering where and how coronavirus originated. This sparks speculations tracing its roots from wild animals in Wuhan, China to its creation in a laboratory.
Health officials are preparing to test more people with the symptoms of active infection. Another step to help control the speed of the contagion is keeping the public informed.
Proper information dessimination is a crucial move that will contain the virus. Doing so may delay its spreading out while it is still manageable, before it turns into an outbreak like Wuhan.
There are two versions of the coronavirus and how it developed into COVID-19, which is tagged as level 4 (the highest biosafety level).
According to one theory, coronavirus is a bioweapon developed for ill reasons. It is a virus of animal origin, which escaped from the lab.
Reports also indicate that it came from Wuhan Institute of Virology, stressing that it is man-made. However, virologists said that they have evidence that coronavirus is new and it came from nature. The Lancet confirmed that the origin of coronavirus is from wildlife and not from the laboratory.
This conspiracy theory has spread in the internet, misinforming many people. One source of this wrong information are several U.S. personalities and politicians who are not objective about the coronavirus origin. There are also China-bashing statements,thus, strengthening the weaponized virus story.
Former White House strategist Steve Bannon told Fox News, that Senator Tom Cotton was correct that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was hiding something from everyone.
Steven Mosher of the New York Post has reinforced the speculation about China's complicity in the leak of the novel coronavirus, saying that their negligence led to the contagion.
More conspiracy talk is prevalent in Chinese social media, spreading rumors that the virus is China-made. However, this kind of report isn't new whenever there's an outbreak.
Gerald Keusch, professor of medicine and international health and associate director of Boston University’s National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories told Vox in an interview, “Conspiracy theories about manmade viruses are not new. We saw this with HIV — the rumor that the US made it and introduced it into Africa. But they are really dangerous kinds of things to get spread around.”
Bruce Aylward, an epidemiologist of the World Health Organization (WHO) said that the investigation determining the coronavirus origin is still ongoing Their current focus is the now closed Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market where the wildlife market is rampant.
Professor of microbiology and immunology at Columbia, Vincent Racaniello commented that tracing the source is important to prevent the contagion from returning. The "This Week in Virology" podcast host also said that the it is likely to originate from bats but there could be an infection between bats and people.
Meanwhile, Dr Jim LeDuc of the Galveston National Laboratory made it clear that working with unsafe viruses is possible, but public health threats like the market in Wuhan are not safe.
With all these stories spreading online, it is important that readers always verify and recheck the information before sharing it. Until now, the origin of coronavirus remains a mystery. However, studies are ongoing because tracking its origin is crucial to kill the virus and stop it from spreading.
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