How close is SARS‐CoV ‐2 to canine and feline coronaviruses?

Dear Editor, Coronaviruses (CoVs) are enveloped positive-sense RNA viruses that can infect a wide variety of species, including human beings and companion animals. The superior genetic plasticity of this virus family is responsible for an extensive host range and results from the accumulation of point mutations and recombination events During the last two decades, three zoonotic CoVs have emerged that cross species barriers: severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV), Middle East respiratory syndrome coronavirus (MERS-CoV) and severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) All of these CoVs originated at the human-animal interface created by progressive deforestation, forest encroachment, anthropization of natural environments and consumption of endangered wildlife (Decaro et al. 2020). SARS-CoV-2 (initially named 2019-nCoV) emerged from the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, China. Preliminary genetic analysis suggested bats as the probable reservoir of SARS-CoV-2 (Malik et al. 2020). Even though SARS-CoV-2 like CoVs has been isolated from Malayan Pangolins, the likelihood of pangolins acting as the intermediate host is low (Tiwari et al. 2020).