Scientists took blood samples between September 2019 and March 2020 as part of a clinical trial for a new screening for lung cancer. A few months later, when examining the blood samples taken in September 2019, they found traces of antibodies specific to SARS-CoV-2.
- Italian researchers took samples from 959 people as part of a clinical trial for lung cancer screening, between September 2019 and March 2020.
- A few months later, by analyzing the samples, 111 blood samples out of 959 contained traces of antibodies specific to SARS-CoV-2. This is particularly the case with a sample taken on September 3, 2019 in Veneto, in the north of the country.
- Covid-19 would therefore be circulating in the world well before the official appearance of the virus in China at the end of December 2019.
The coronavirus may have been with us for much longer than we think. In a study published on November 11, 2020 in the Tumor Diarya team of researchers from the National Cancer Institute of Milan (Italy) claims to have found traces of SARS-CoV-2 at the beginning of September in Italy.
Unintentionally discovered cases
The first two cases of Covid-19 recorded in Italy took place on January 30, 2020, when two Chinese tourists tested positive in Rome for SARS-CoV-2. It was not until three weeks later, on February 20, 2020, that the first case of an Italian infected with the coronavirus without having traveled or having had contact with positive people was officially registered by the authorities. Less than a month later, the regions of Lombardy and Veneto begin their confinement.
But then, where do the traces found in September 2019 come from? The discovery was made somewhat by chance. Initially, Italian researchers were conducting an experiment on 959 participants, to develop a new device to screen for lung cancer in a clinical trial.
For the purposes of the trial, which began in September 2019, the participants took blood samples, which they stopped in March 2020, at the start of the Italian confinement. It was only much later that the researchers discovered, by analyzing these samples, specific antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 in the blood of 111 of the 959 patients. In the second samples, this time taken in February 2020, more than 30% of them contained SARS-CoV-2 antibodies.
Northern Italy particularly affected
Cases positive for specific SARS-CoV-2 antibodies were found in samples from September 3, 2019 in the Veneto region, northeastern Italy. Other samples showing that people had been infected were also found in Emilia-Romagna on September 4, in Liguria on September 5, in Lombardy on September 9 and in Lazio on September 13.
The 959 participants were recruited from across Italy, and Covid-19 antibodies were found in at least 13 regions, with cases predominating in Lombardy, which had 59 cases alone.
It should be noted that all people who had coronavirus antibodies in their blood were asymptomatic carriers, who themselves did not know that they had already encountered this virus. In addition, the researchers indicate that the calculation methods used by the Italian government are not necessarily the right ones, since the prevalence of the number of cases in the country would be underestimated according to them.
In their conclusion, the researchers instead put forward the figure of one and a half million Italians who have been in contact with the virus, five times more than the official figures recorded, with many asymptomatic people.
This study demonstrates that the circulation of the virus was much earlier than expected, since these Italian cases are much earlier than the Chinese cases recorded in Wuhan (China) in December 2019. This discovery will only accentuate the questions about the origin of this virus and how long it has been in our environment.
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