A Chinese team has found a new bat coronavirus that carries the risk of animal-to-human transmission because it uses the same human receptor as the virus that causes Covid-19.
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The study was led by Shi Zhengli – a leading virologist known as the “batwoman” due to her extensive research on bat coronaviruses – at the Guangzhou Laboratory along with researchers from the Guangzhou Academy of Sciences, Wuhan University and the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
Shi is best known for her work at the Wuhan institute, which has been at the centre of the controversy about the origins of Covid, with one theory suggesting it came from a lab leak in the city.
While there is still no consensus on the origin of the virus, some studies suggest it originated in bats and jumped to humans through an intermediate animal host. Shi has denied that the institute was to blame for the outbreak.
The latest discovery is a new lineage of the HKU5 coronavirus first identified in the Japanese pipistrelle bat in Hong Kong.
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The new virus comes from the merbecovirus subgenus, which also includes the virus that causes Middle East respiratory syndrome (Mers).
The virus is able to bind to the human angiotensin converting enzyme (ACE2), the same receptor used by the Sars-CoV-2 virus, which causes Covid-19, to infect cells.