China is preparing to test tens of thousands of blood samples from the residents of Wuhan in central China, as part of an extensive investigation to trace the origin of the coronavirus that first emerged in this city, according to a Chinese official. This move comes amid increasing calls for transparency regarding the virus's origins, which began in China and spread worldwide, spawning various theories about the origins of the pandemic and how it transmitted to the "patient zero."
Health authorities intend to test around 200,000 samples stored in Wuhan's blood bank, including samples from the last months of 2019 when the disease began to spread in China before moving abroad, as reported by the American news network CNN. This step was based on recommendations from World Health Organization (WHO) investigators, who believe that blood analysis could be a significant source of key information that may help determine how, when, and where the virus first transmitted to humans.
Health experts suggest that the samples, if preserved correctly, could contain "critical markers for the first antibodies produced by humans against the disease." Yanzhong Huang, a senior fellow in global health at the Council on Foreign Relations in China, told CNN, "This provides the closest we have seen from samples (...) to help us understand the timing of the outbreak."
On the other hand, Maureen Miller, an assistant professor of epidemiology at Columbia University, stated that the samples "will definitely contain vital evidence" useful for tracing the origin of COVID-19 and urged Beijing to allow foreign experts to observe the process. She added, "No one will believe any results reported by China unless there are qualified observers."
In July, Liang Wannian, head of the Chinese team working with the WHO in its investigation into the origins of COVID-19, stated that his country would test the samples, adding that "once the Chinese experts obtain the results, they will share them with both Chinese and foreign expert teams." Since the early months of the disease's emergence, the topic of the origins of the coronavirus has generated significant debate, particularly between China, the United States, and the World Health Organization.
