Coronavirus surveillance in wildlife from two Congo basin countries detects RNA of multiple species circulating in bats and rodents.

ABSTRACT: Coronaviruses play an important role as pathogens of humans and animals, and the emergence of epidemics like SARS, MERS and COVID-19 is closely linked to zoonotic transmission events primarily from wild animals. Bats have been found to be an important source of coronaviruses with some of them having the potential to infect humans, with other animals serving as intermediate or alternate hosts or reservoirs. Host diversity may be an important contributor to viral diversity and thus the potential for zoonotic events. To date, limited research has been done in Africa on this topic, in particular in the Congo Basin despite frequent contact between humans and wildlife in this region. We sampled and, using consensus coronavirus PCR-primers, tested 3,561 wild animals for coronavirus RNA. The focus

SUBMITTER: Kumakamba C 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC8189465 | biostudies-literature | 2021

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature