How did the first 41 patients identified get the new coronavirus?

The new coronavirus 2019-nCoV responsible for the pneumonia epidemic from Wuhan (China) is gradually revealing its secrets at an unprecedented speed, even though many unknowns are still hovering over its ability to spread and its virulence.

Two articles published online, Friday 24 January, by the British journal The Lancet confirm that it is spread well from person to person and causes symptoms that are not identical to Severe acute respiratory syndrome (SARS).

The acquisition by this animal virus of the capacity to be contagious between humans explains the spectacular multiplication of the cases identified in China – nearly 1,300, including 41 fatalities have been identified -, and the potential for dissemination outside the country. The latter are also on the rise and spilling over from Asia.

Three patients, the first in Europe, were confirmed in France on Friday evening, January 24, one in Bordeaux and the other two in Paris. All three returned from China and were placed in hospital isolation. The patient hospitalized in Bordeaux is doing well and has been in contact with a dozen people whom the health authorities will reach. The other two, a couple, are currently at Bichat Hospital (Paris).

Willingness to be transparent

After the publication, on January 21, of an article by researchers from the Shanghai Pasteur Institute retracing the genealogy of the virus, eleven days after the first sequences of the 2019-nCoV genome were shared within the scientific community, publication by The Lancet of this scientific information, in free access, in record time marks a desire for transparency for which argue the editorial of the magazine and one comment by David Heyman (London School of Hygiene and Tropical Diseases), a world authority on the epidemiology of infectious diseases. It is essential to better understand the mechanisms of this epidemic and combat it.

A first article by Chaolin Huang (Jin Yin-tan Hospital, Wuhan) and colleagues analyze data for the first 41 patients with 2019-nCoV admitted to Wuhan Hospital between December 16, 2019 and January 2.

Their average age is 49 years and three quarters (thirty patients) are men. Among them, two-thirds (twenty-seven patients) were directly exposed on the Huanan Seafood Wholesale; this now famous fish and seafood market, where various other animals and game meat are also sold, was the starting point for the first human cases of pneumonia due to 2019-nCoV.

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