Wuhan's seafood market amplified pandemic, WHO advisory group

An early investigation into the origins of the SARS-CoV-2 virus by a World Health Organization (WHO) advisory group suggested that the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, China played an important role in the amplification of the pandemic. However, further investigations are recommended. In their first report, a WHO advisory group, Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens (Sago) said that key recommendations are provided for further studies needed on humans, animals and the environment in China and around the world that would provide additional information and contribute to a better understanding of how SARS-CoV-2 infected the human population and spread. The expert group of WHO has mentioned that since lab accidents in the past have triggered some outbreaks, this particular theory could not be dismissed.

However, experts also said that no studies were provided to WHO that assessed the possibility of COVID-19 resulting from a lab leak. In March 2021, WHO released a report about COVID-19's origins following a highly choreographed visit by international scientists to China. The report concluded that the disease most likely jumped into humans from bats and that there was no evidence to suggest there was a connection to a laboratory.

At the present time, currently available epidemiological and sequencing data suggest ancestral strains to SARS-CoV-2 have a zoonotic origin with the closest genetically related viruses being beta coronaviruses,identified in Rhinolophus bats in China in 2013 and Laos in 2020.