A doc at Oxford University's Centre for Evidence-Based Medicine says coronavirus may have lain dormant across the world rather than starting in China
- there is growing evidence the virus was elsewhere before it emerged in Asia
- Spanish virologists say they found traces of COVID-19 in samples of waste water collected in March 2019 (this is 9 months ahead of the Wuhan outbreak)
- Italian scientists have also found evidence of the virus in sewage samples in Milan and Turin, from mid-December 2019
- Traces have also been found ion Brazil from November 2019
Dr Jefferson believes that many viruses lie dormant throughout the globe and emerge when conditions are favourable:
- "The explanation could only be that these agents don't come or go anywhere. They are always here and something ignites them, maybe human density or environmental conditions, and this is what we should look for"
- believes the virus may be transmitted through the sewerage system or shared toilets, not just through droplets expelled by talking, coughing and sneezing
