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SARS-CoV-2 is the seventh known coronavirus to infect people, after 229E, NL63, OC43, HKU1, MERS-CoV, and the original SARS-CoV. [105] Like the SARS-related coronavirus implicated in the 2003 SARS outbreak, SARS‑CoV‑2 is a member of the subgenus Sarbecovirus (beta-CoV lineage B). [106] [107] Coronaviruses undergo frequent recombination. [108]
Several studies found only weak signs of adaptive evolution early in the COVID-19 pandemic. [c] Kang et al. wrote that SARS-CoV-2 had exhibited relatively little genetic variation by 2021. [47] Tai et al. wrote that population expansion rather than positive selection explained the mutation frequency spectrum during the early pandemic. [49]
The earliest reports of a coronavirus infection in animals occurred in the late 1920s, when an acute respiratory infection of domesticated chickens emerged in North America. [15] Arthur Schalk and M.C. Hawn in 1931 made the first detailed report which described a new respiratory infection of chickens in North Dakota.
Omicron (B.1.1.529) is a variant of SARS-CoV-2 first reported to the World Health Organization (WHO) by the Network for Genomics Surveillance in South Africa on 24 November 2021.
The FBI concluded with "moderate confidence" that COVID-19 may have been created in a laboratory, based in part on genomic analysis conducted by scientists at the National Center for Medical Intelligence. [98] On 20 March 2023, the COVID-19 Origin Act of 2023 was signed into law. On June 23, 2023, the Biden administration released its report ...
Coronavirus diseases are caused by viruses in the coronavirus subfamily, a group of related RNA viruses that cause diseases in mammals and birds. In humans and birds, the group of viruses cause respiratory tract infections that can range from mild to lethal.
The COVID-19 vaccines are widely credited for their role in reducing the severity and death caused by COVID-19. [ 128 ] [ 129 ] As of March 2023, more than 5.5 billion people had received one or more doses [ 130 ] (11.8 billion in total) in over 197 countries.
The history of coronaviruses is an account of the discovery of the diseases caused by coronaviruses and the diseases they cause. It starts with the first report of a new type of upper-respiratory tract disease among chickens in North Dakota, U.S., in 1931.