Zoonosis and the Modern Food System

By Ann Hudgins, U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service Division of Public Affairs; Modified by Fir0002 — This image originates from the National Digital Library of the United States Fish and Wildlife Serviceat this pageThis tag does not indicate the copyright status of the attached work. A normal copyright tag is still required. See Commons:Licensing.See Category:Images from the United States Fish and Wildlife Service.(link no longer available), Public Domain, https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=326715

There is another aspect to our food system that is darker, and far less well understood. Never mind we are likely living through the consequence of it. SARS-COV-2 is most likely a jump from an animal reservoir to humans. Yes, that COVID-19. Like SARS it is an RNA virus in the Corona family. They are called this way because of the familiar ring of spike protein under the electron microscope. Nor are these two the first Coronaviruses to affect humans. The early exposures in the 1960s were mild.

The first HCoV-229E strain, B814, was isolated from the nasal discharge of patients with common cold in mid-1960s 12. Since then, more knowledge was accumulated through extensive studies on HCoV-229E and HCoV-OC43, both of which cause self-limiting symptoms 13. Indeed, the concept had been widely accepted that infection with HCoVs is generally harmless until the outbreak of SARS. The SARS outbreak occurred in 2003 is one of the most devastating in current history, infecting over 8,000 people with a crude case fatality of approximately 10% 14,15. Ten years later, the Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS) outbreak resulted in a persistent epidemic in the Arabian Peninsula with sporadic spreading to the rest of the world 16–18. The 2019 novel HCoV (2019-nCoV), which has subsequently been renamed SARS-CoV-2, is the causative agent of the ongoing epidemic of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19)…