Scientists have confirmed exactly where the epicentre of the deadly coronavirus outbreak which has infected more than 2700 people and killed at least 81, began in Wuhan, China.
Experts from the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said tests confirmed the virus first jumped from animals to humans inside the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in the heart of city, according to China’s state-owned Xinhua news agency.
The “wet” market which includes live animals for sale had been reported as the source of the outbreak, however samples now confirm that is the case after testing was carried out.
“Thirty-one of the 33 positive samples were collected from the western zone of the market, where booths of wildlife trading concentrated,” the CDC said.
“The result suggests that the novel coronavirus outbreak is highly relevant to the trading of the wild animals,” experts said.
Wildlife sold at the market for human consumption included wolf cubs, civet cats, bats, rats, dogs, pigs, snakes, chickens, donkeys, badgers, bamboo rats, hedgehogs and deer. Wet markets place people and live and dead animals in close contact, making it easy for a virus to jump species.
The confirmation comes as China ramped up its sweeping efforts to contain the virus on Monday by extending its Lunar New Year holiday.
The end of the holiday period — China’s busiest travel season — was pushed back from Thursday to Sunday to “reduce mass gatherings” and “block the spread of the epidemic”, a Cabinet statement said.
Schools will also postpone reopening until further notice, it added.
Tens of millions of people had been due to crowd into planes, trains and buses to return to work after visiting their hometowns or tourist sites for the holiday.
But China’s health minister, Ma Xiaowei, has admitted the country is now entering a “crucial stage” where “the ability of the virus to spread is getting stronger”.
The government of Shanghai, a metropolis of 25 million people and a global business centre, extended its Lunar New Year holiday by an additional week to February 9, while Hong Kong also announced it would bar entry to all travellers from the country’s Hubei province, starting Monday.
The National Health Commission said 2,744 cases had been confirmed by midnight on Sunday. The youngest patient is a 9-month-old girl in Beijing.
On Monday, China’s number two leader, Premier Li Keqiang, visited Wuhan to observe the work being done by health officials.
Photos posted online showed Li, in a blue smock and green face mask, meeting with hospital employees and later visiting a supermarket.
“To get the epidemic under control in Wuhan and the good health of people in Wuhan will be good news for the whole country,” Li told a crowd of shoppers.
“We wish the people of Wuhan a safe, healthy and long life. Let’s go, Wuhan!”
Most vehicle use, including private cars, has now been banned in Wuhan’s downtown areas. About 6,000 taxis have instead been assigned to neighbourhoods to help people get around if they need to.
The city is also building two hospitals, one with 1,500 beds and another with 1,000, for the growing number of patients. The first is scheduled to be finished next week.
China paying the price for extreme animal cruelty
If you’ve been following the progression of the coronavirus outbreak, then you likely know that authorities are blaming tainted meat sold at the Wuhan, China, Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market for causing it. This market, in case you didn’t know, sells all sorts of “exotic” meats derived from rodents, as well as from animals that most people consider to be pets, not food – and many of these animals undergo extreme abuse before being slaughtered for their meat.
As you can see from the animal meat visual presented at this link, the Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market sells not just the usual meats like chicken, pork and beef, but also meat derived from foxes, koalas, dogs, scorpions, snakes and horses. Other reports also say that the meat of wolves, bats, and rats is sold at this market as well.
While the media is mostly focusing on the gross factor associated with eating rodent meat, which can harbor all sorts of infectious diseases, what they’re not diving into is the horrific lives that the more sentient animals have to endure before being carved up and consumed by the Chinese.
More than 10 million dogs and four million cats are slaughtered every year in China, and many of these are family pets that unscrupulous Chinese traders steal and force into cages before later slaughtering them and selling their meat.
Reports indicate that many of these dogs and cats have their limbs broken as they’re stuffed into these cages, and are transported very long distances without being given any food or water. When they arrive to meat markets like the one in Wuhan, these poor animals are often injured, dehydrated and exhausted, and are forced to watch other dogs and cats in terror be bludgeoned to death or tossed alive into boiling water to remove their skins.
Such horrific practices take place every day in China, which has some people asking themselves: is coronavirus a type of divine payback for this extreme animal abuse?
Yulin, China, actually holds an annual “Dog Meat Festival” to celebrate canine consumption
If you can even believe it, there’s a city in China known as Yulin that holds an annual “Lychee and Dog Meat Festival” to celebrate the eating of dog meat. And, sadly, the number of dogs slaughtered at this event represents just 0.01 percent of the total Chinese dog trade, which occurs all across the country.
“The dog meat industry has long claimed that it farms dogs for their meat, boasting more than 100 registered ‘dog meat farms,’” reports the group Animals Asia.
“But in 2015, a four-year undercover investigation by Animals Asia into the Chinese dog meat trade exposed these claims as false. None of its registered ‘farms’ had more than 30 dogs on-site and such small scale operations cannot possibly meet such a demand.”
In other words, China is lying about how many dogs it’s abusing and killing so their meat can be harvested and sold at a premium. It’s these and other horrific practices taking place in China that suggest coronavirus might just be the beginning of sorrows for China, so to speak.
Other abused animals sold in China for their meat include civets, which are similar to cats. Civets, along with rats and bats, are considered to be a delicacy throughout China, as well as in other nearby Asian countries.
“Poorly regulated, live animal markets mixed with illegal wildlife trade offer a unique opportunity for viruses to spill over from wildlife hosts into the human population,” reads an official statement from the Wildlife Conservation Society about China’s filthy and abusive animal meat underground.
To keep up with the latest coronavirus news, be sure to check out Outbreak.news.
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Do we need to continue to cover up for the bat/rat eaters?