The virus epidemic in China has caused the quarantine of millions of people in the country. Hundreds of cases have been reported in China and other countries around the world. Several people have died after contracting the virus.
Faced with this epidemic, many of you have pressed the orange button Alert us to ask us a question. “Are the many parcels coming from China via e-commerce dangerous for Europe, for example? Are these viruses active outside of a host like the human body?“, asked Alexis, for example.
No risk for packages from China
The question caught our attention and our presenter Thomas De Bergeyck asked it to a specialist during RTL INFO 18H on Bel RTL radio. Emmanuel André was the guest of the newspaper. He is a microbiologist, professor of medicine at KU Leuven and member of the coronavirus reference team. According to him, there is no risk. “No, absolutely not, unless you want to import bats, there is really no problem“replied the expert.
Where does the virus come from?
Emmanuel André explained that it was a virus that originally affected animals. “It is a virus that we discovered a few weeks ago. It is part of the coronavirus family. These are viruses found mainly in animals. But from time to time, and these last fifteen years it is the third that mutates and becomes infectious for humans: we had SARS, MERS, and then now this famous virus 2019 which comes from Wuhan“, said Emmanuel André.
The virus is close to the one that caused the SARS epidemic in 2002-2003. It had killed 774 people worldwide (including 349 in mainland China and 299 in Hong Kong) out of 8,096 cases, according to the World Health Organization (WHO).
China has shared with the international scientific community the genomic sequencing of the coronavirus, for the moment entitled “2019-nCoV”.
Even if debates on the exact origin of the virus still stir the scientific world, Emmanuel André indicated that “it is known that this type of virus circulates in bats and other animals, the probable cause [de transmission] is therefore close contact between humans and animals that were carriers of the virus“.
How does it spread?
The specialist also specified the mode of transmission of the virus in question. “The initial contact between the first patient and the animal, probably will never be known. But human-to-human transmission, which is now documented, takes place by air, therefore by drops of saliva which pass from one person to another. So with close contacts“said Emmanuel André. These drops of saliva can be transmitted when sneezing, coughing or during intimate contact between people.
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