by Hal Brown, MSW
I was reading an article in the journal Cell which was referenced in this sobering NY Times article: Did a Mutation Help the Coronavirus Spread? More Evidence, but Lingering Questions?
On Thursday, a team of researchers reported new evidence that is likely to deepen the debate rather than settle it, experts said; too many uncertainties remain, in a pandemic that changes shape by the day.
The new report, posted by the journal Cell and led by investigators at Los Alamos National Laboratory, suggested that the variant did have such an advantage. Other researchers said the findings were not yet definitive.
I clicked the link above and found the article:
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A SARS-CoV-2 variant with Spike G614 has replaced D614 as the dominant pandemic form
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The consistent increase of G614 at regional levels may indicate a fitness advantage
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G614 is associated with lower RT PCR Ct’s, suggestive of higher viral loads in patients
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The G614 variant grows to higher titers as pseudotyped virions
While I am not an expert the highlights above did not seem to bode well. Then I looked at the comments.
It had only one. It asked an important question.
Robert Eibl • 3 days ago
Further mutations are quite likely to come; they could affect both, the easier spread, and the severity of the disease even in younger patients. Currently, many mammalian species can also transmit the disease within their species (cats, tigers, lions, ferrets, dogs). Despite some findings in Wuhan with 15% of tested cats (from about 100) showed antibodies against Sars-CoV-2 (but none of the reference blood samples from before the outbreak was positive), little is tested anyhwere else - leading to the potentially false suggestion of the WHO that there is no evidence for a major transmission from pet-to-human. I wonder how this currently dominating mutation affects the infection rate in cats, and if this may support an easier transmission from cat to human?
I clicked Eibi’s name and discovered he had similar comments to two other articles:
Initially, the WHO claimed there was no human-to-human transmission; later the WHO claimed there was no transmission to pets; meanwhile both claims were shown clearly wrong. The WHO sees still "no hint" for a transmission from pet to human, but I think one should see it differently: one can not exclude such a transmission, for example, in areas with many "free" cats, like Italy, Spain. With cats tested positive (15% with antibody tests) in Wuhan one should be careful with unproven statements by the WHO. It may be possible that the virus spreads from human to pets, including dogs, but with so many uncertainties one should consider the humans got infected by dogs, the dogs perhaps infected by cats. So far, nobody seems to have tested for SARS-CoV-2 the "mysterious dog's disease" last summer in Oslo, Norway with many dogs dead and more very ill - https://www.linkedin.com/po...
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I just found this manuscript three weeks after it appeared on bioRxiv - and two days after two cats in New York were announced by CDC to have an infection with Sars-CoV-2. I am really surprised that this important manuscript is not mentioned in the general media worldwide, as a headline. I think this is very solid evidence for cats getting this new virus, not just as an exception, but at a high rate in areas with an outbreak. Of course, it won't be that easy to detect an infection of a human by a cat, but it is known by now that humans can infect humans, cats can infect cats (experimentally via air droplets). It wouldn't surprise me if there is also apossible transmission from cat to human. There should be also tests in other areas in the world, especially with many cats, like in Spain, Italy, France. In addition, I suggest to test dogs in Oslo, Norway, where there was an outbreak of a "mysterious dog's disease" (CNN) last August, September 2019, with about 40 dogs dead and over 240 extremely sick. Perhaps, one could test the surviving dogs for antibodies against Sars-CoV-2, or cats in same or neighboring households? Anyway, this paper appears to be very important to look at any possible ways of spread.
I wondered who Robert Eibi was.
I looked him up and learned he was an academic researcher at Technische Universität München with 63 publications cited 1230 times mostly in the 1990’s about cancer and DNA. I think his concerns should be taken seriously and hopefully researched.
Addendum
There was concern expressed in online discussions about pets expressed when several of the big cats at the Bronx Zoo tested positive Covid and when the antibodies were found in a few domestic cats and dogs. This is the notice from the CDC COVID-19 and Animals. It was updated on June 22nd.