host the foxlike mammals are susceptible to coronaviruses and were being sold live at the huanan market he saidthe goldstandard piece of evidence for an animal origin would be an infected animal from there goldstein said but as far as we know the market was cleared outearlier this year a joint report by the world health organisation and china called the transmission of the virus from bats to humans through another animal the most likely scenario and a lab leak extremely unlikelybut that report also sowed doubt by pegging the first known covid19 case as an accountant who had no connection to the huanan market and first showed symptoms on dec 8 2019 worobey said proponents of the lableak theory point to that case in claiming the virus escaped from a wuhan institute of virology facility near where the man livedaccording to worobeys research however the man said in an interview that his dec 8 illness was actually a dental problem and his covid19 symptoms began on dec 16 a date confirmed in hospital recordsworobeys analysis identifies an earlier case a vendor in the huanan market who came down with covid19 on december 11animal threatsexperts worry the same sort of animaltohuman transmission of viruses could spark new pandemics and worsen this onesince covid19 emerged many types of animals have gotten infected including pet cats dogs and ferrets zoo animals such as big cats otters and nonhuman primates farmraised mink and whitetailed deermost got the virus from people according to the us centres for disease control and prevention which says that humans can spread it to animals during close contact but that the risk of animals transmitting it to people is lowanother fear however is that animals could unleash new viral variants some wonder if the omicron variant began this wayaround the world we might have animals potentially incubating these variants even if we get covid19 under control in humans said david oconnor a virology expert at the university of wisconsinmadison were probably not going to do a big giraffe immunization program any time soonworobey said he has been looking for genetic fingerprints that might indicate whether omicron was created when the virus jumped from humans to an animal mutated and then leaped back to peopleexperts say preventing zoonotic disease will require not only cracking down on illegal wildlife sales but making progress on big global problems that increase risky humananimal contact such as habitat destruction and climate changefailing to fully investigate the animal origin of the virus scientists said in the cell paper would leave the world vulnerable to future pandemics arising from the same human activities that have repeatedly put us on a collision course with novel virusestoxic politicsbut further investigation is stymied by superpower politics lawrence gostin of georgetown university said there has been a bareknuckles fight between china and the united statesthe politics around the origins investigation has literally poisoned the well of global cooperation said gostin director of the who collaborating centre on national and