INVESTIGATING THE ORIGINS OF COVID-19 | Pt.1

Coronavirus disease 2019 is a contagious disease caused by severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2. The first case was identified in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. The disease has since spread worldwide, leading to an ongoing pandemic.

Corona Virus are a very diverse family of viruses. Both COVID-19 and SARS are caused by coronaviruses. The virus that causes SARS is known as SARS-CoV-1, while the virus that causes COVID-19 is known as SARS-CoV-2. They have a large host range, which includes humans. However, the greatest amount of coronavirus diversity is seen bats. Most of the time, human coronaviruses cause mild respiratory illnesses like the common cold. Hence only about 774 were lost in the first SARS outbreak in 2002. An even lower mortality count of 282 with MERS since the initial outbreak in 2012.

Given the massive death toll by SARS-COV-2 which has now claimed close to 4 million lives worldwide, most scientists think understanding how and where the virus originated is crucial to prevent it happening again. But while the origin is hotly debated and weighed in on by political partisanship and broader geopolitical interests, I find the biggest question to be how did a Corona virus go from the mild symptoms of a common cold to the deadliest pandemic of the millennium? This in more and this week’s episode: WATCH Part 1/2