As the world marks three years since the COVID-19 pandemic began, reports and theories about the origins of the virus continue to garner international attention. A new report suggests that raccoon dogs, a fox-like creature native to East Asia, may have played a role in the early spread of the virus.
According to a summary of findings first reported by The Atlantic, an international team of virus experts collected swab samples from and around the Wuhan’s Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market at the start of the pandemic in early 2020, shortly after the Chinese authorities had shut down the market.
The samples contained genetic traces of raccoon dogs, leading researchers to suspect that the animals may have been “carrying and possibly shedding the virus” as early as the end of 2019.
While the findings did not definitively conclude that raccoon dogs carried the virus or passed it on to humans, they did not rule out the possibility that other animals at the wet market could have been infected.
In February, various U.S. agencies concluded with “low confidence” that COVID-19 originated in a lab. The Chinese government continues to deny the claims.