Coronavirus lurking in feces may be a hidden source of spread
Source: Japan Times
MELBOURNE, AUSTRALIA While doctors have focused on respiratory samples from pneumonia cases to identify coronavirus patients, they might have ignored a less apparent source of the spread: diarrhea.
The novel coronavirus was detected in the loose stool of the first U.S. case a finding that hasnt featured among case reports from Wuhan, China, the epicenter of the outbreak. However, that doesnt surprise scientists who have studied coronaviruses, nor doctors familiar with the bug that caused SARS.
Diarrhea occurred in about 10 to 20 percent of patients afflicted with severe acute respiratory syndrome about 17 years ago and was the source of an explosive SARS outbreak in the Amoy Gardens residential complex in Hong Kong.
SARS and Wuhan viruses bind to the same distinctly shaped protein receptors in the body that are expressed in the lungs and intestines, making these organs the primary targets for both viruses, said Fang Li, an associate professor of veterinary and biomedical sciences at the University of Minnesota.
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Read more: https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2020/02/02/asia-pacific/science-health-asia-pacific/coronavirus-feces-risk-of-spread/#.XjcxLWhKjIU
stopdiggin
(11,089 posts)common symptom in the new corona as opposed to older (SARS) versions. Which would make it a less important (or likely) vector.
Wellstone ruled
(34,661 posts)Farmers never let Hogs near Chickens or other Fowl.
Farmer-Rick
(10,072 posts)I had a neighbor's pet potbelly pig come over here regularly despite the dogs that continually attacked him. Five times that pig came over here. Each time I called my neighbor, penned up the dogs and caught the pig. They seemed not to care. I would find the remains of the chickens in the pen each time he visited. He was not trained to electric fences so he ran right through them, tore down the wire fence and chowed down. I lost 6 chickens.
The last time he was here my dogs took a huge chunk out of his side. I didn't know the pig was here and the dogs were free on my property. They tore into that poor pig until I heard the noise and broke them up. It was trying to get to the chickens ....again.
I tried to catch it but it ran off with a piece of it's side hanging down. I called the neighbors yet again. Never saw the pig after that.
Pigs will eat chickens and fowls if they can catch them.
Wellstone ruled
(34,661 posts)Chicken Droppings are like Candy to Pigs. We learned first hand what just could go wrong with allowing free range Chickens getting into the Hog Lot. This was in 1952,we lost our Brood Sows do to a Virus,our local Vet at the time traced the Virus back to a bird virus past from our Chickens to our Hogs via Feces.
BTW,that was the last time for Hogs as well as free range chickens.
Farmer-Rick
(10,072 posts)Interesting.
I haven't kept pigs for a long time. I just get the neighbors' pigs who come and visit.
I have a small sway-back white with black spots pig roaming along my stream bed right now. I caught sight of it the other day and realized it has created trails all along my pasture. So it's been roaming for at least 3 months. I hope it is a miniature because I can't have it growing up and becoming dangerous....and eating my chickens. It followed me but kept far enough away that I couldn't catch it. I'm surprised the numerous coyotes haven't killed it yet.
This is the 3rd pig come to visit.
What is it with people who can't keep their pigs on their property?
Wellstone ruled
(34,661 posts)to have a fresh out of School Vet at the time. His extra study at the U of Missouri was Animal Infectious Disease and transfer. Just a hunch that paid off. And even back in the fifties,Vet Schools were at that time suspecting there was a chance that a Virus in Hogs could make the jump to Humans via airborne spores or contact via touch.
Warpy
(110,900 posts)after the patient had recovered. I am hoping the current strain is far less persistent. Then again, testing some of the general population with lower GI problems but no vomiting might turn up the fact that intestinal coronavirus is already endemic in areas that use human feces as fertilizer without first composting it.
There are just too many unknowns at this point. So far, it doesn't look disastrous, the spread isn't that efficient.
dalton99a
(81,065 posts)Ultimately, a total of 329 residents at Amoy Gardens came down with SARS and 42 were to die, 22 of them at Block E, .
Within 24 hours a team of experts found evidence the building's sewerage was involved in the vertical spread of the virus.
Intense diarrhea from one of the patients -- a 33-year-old Shenzhen resident in Hong Kong for kidney treatment and identified only as patient YY -- was believed to have spread the disease through defective piping in the building.
According to the Department of Health, a break in E block's flush-water system earlier that month had meant the water-sealed S-bend in some of the apartments' toilets had been dry for an extended period, allowing virus-laden droplets to collect from the system's soil pipe.
Bucket flushing by residents may have disturbed and released contaminated droplets, government agencies said. Similarly, exhaust fans may have sucked droplets into bathrooms where the virus was deposited on floor mats, towels, toiletries and toothbrushes.
Even then, the government had to work quickly to quash panic sparked by medical conjecture that exhaust fans had drawn contaminated droplets into the building's light well, a disturbing development, if it had been true, that would have meant the virus was airborne.
Margaret Chan, Director General of the World Health Organization, but then head of the Hong Kong Department of Health, said the fight against SARS was a triumph of dogged medical work.
SARS was believed to have originated in civet cats at the exotic food markets of southern China, leaping the species barrier through human contact, possibly even through the food chain.
https://www.cnn.com/2013/02/21/world/asia/sars-amoy-gardens/index.html
soryang
(3,299 posts)Last edited Mon Feb 3, 2020, 12:51 PM - Edit history (1)
of coronavirus according to Thae Yong Ho. With virtually no fertilizer or fuel due to sanctions farmers and others use excrement for fertilizer, and have animals living with them in their living quarters.
Uncharacteristically for the outspoken opponent of the North Korean dictatorship, he recommended cooperation with South Korea and the international community for equipment and establishment of facilities and organization to contain the virus. He said the North Korean health care resources are wholly inadequate to cope with the health care challenge and noted the spread of the Asian swine flu virus across the DMZ into South Korea as proof of their incapaciity.
Thae said that it was necessary for the North's communist leader to swallow his pride and request assistance.