Researchers have discovered three new Coronaviruses related to SARS-CoV-2 that could pose a health risk to humans. Their findings were published in Nature magazine on Wednesday by scientists from the National University of Laos and the Institut Pasteur du Laos.
According to a paper published in Nature, these scientists have found that viruses named BANAL-103, BANAL-236, and BANAL-52 have genomic similarities to SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus responsible for the global pandemic. New coronaviruses share certain characteristics, specifically in a ‘key domain of the spike protein that enables the virus to bind to the host cell’. In their observations, the scientists have noted that all three of these coronaviruses can enter human cells using the same receptor as SARS-CoV-2.
‘The discovery of these viruses in the bat animal reservoir supports the theory that SARS-CoV-2 was shed by bats inhabiting the high karst plateaus in Indochina, including Laos, Vietnam, and China,’ Head of the Pathogen Discovery Laboratory, said. Marc Eloit, director of the Pasteur Institute said that the results indicated that ‘related viruses could pose a health risk for humans’. The discovery of new coronaviruses in bats lends weight to the theory that the pandemic-causing coronavirus originated in animals.
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