Where Did COVID-19 Come From?
For decades we’ve just hit the snooze button and haven’t taken the warning signs seriously. These viruses are not new. What is new is that this time it’s gone global. So where did COVID-19 come from?
Let’s start with a bit of history.
In 2003 we had the coronavirus SARS — the source was bats and civet cats, caught from the wild and kept live in animal markets for food. This one originated in Asia.
Going even further back to the 1920s we got HIV which jumped from monkeys killed for bushmeat and eaten. There were around 25–30 million human victims and this originated in the Republic of Congo.
In 2009 we had the swine flu which jumped from pigs to humans beginning in Mexico and in 2012 another coronavirus hit, MERS which came from dromedary camels in the Middle East. It’s not known exactly where the virus began and it’s believed that the camels were a secondary host who passed it to humans.
Now don’t think the Western countries are fine. Another type of swine flu originated in the USA via pigs and in England, the Mad Cow disease (BSE) began because cows were fed meat and bone from food that contained BSE-infected products from a spontaneously occurring case of BSE or scrapie-infected cow or sheep products. Think about this for a moment — cows are herbivores… why would farmers feed them animal products?
And now COVID-19, as it is a coronavirus it is definitely from a zoonotic source, the two main suspects are pangolins and horseshoe bats. Both of which are killed and sold in wet markets in Wuhan where scientists believe the global pandemic originate.
There are many theories going around one of which is that COVID-19 came from a lab where it was being created for biological warfare. Regardless, this virus has come from an animal and it is this that should be the main centre of concern.
Thankfully, China has now banned the wild animal markets (for now?), but there will still be a lot of black-market trading going on. But don’t blame the Chinese. Remember that the 1918 Spanish Flu which killed anywhere between 17 and 50 million people, came from chickens. It was made worse by ‘modern transportation’ of soldiers, sailors and civilians. That was 102 years ago — you’d think we’d learn!
The way we continue to farm animals, especially chickens and pigs, we are setting ourselves up for another outbreak. Perhaps it won’t be as bad if countries shut their borders quickly as soon as an outbreak occurs. But wouldn’t it be better to actually get to the source of it all?
We need to start phasing out the factory farms and start promoting plant-based eating. We need to understand that animals, farmed or wild are not ours to eat or use in any manner.
(sigh) I doubt I’ll see it in my lifetime, but there’s a very strong probability I’ll see another lock-down… even could be more than one.
An excellent video to watch is Dr Greger who explains the history of all the viruses “Pandemics: History & Prevention”. The amazing part is that this was recorded more than a decade ago when he was Public Health Director at the HSUS in Washington DC. Dr Greger had specialised in infectious diseases so I would say he had a pretty darn good grasp of the situation.
It’s well worth watching:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7_ppXSABYLY&feature=em-uploademail
Until next time….
Originally published at https://goldcardvegan.com on April 29, 2020.
