Chinese researchers discover new bat coronavirus

Researchers in China say they have discovered a new bat coronavirus that could infect humans.

A Chinese virologist known as “batwoman” and a team of researchers have found a new bat coronavirus, and it carries the risk of animal-to-human transmission.

The findings were published this week as a study titled “Bat-infecting merbecovirus HKU5-CoV lineage 2 can use human ACE2 as a cell entry receptor” in biology journal Cell.

The new lineage of the HKU5 coronavirus (HKU5-CoV-2) discovered in bats uses the same human receptor as the virus that causes Covid-19 (Sars-CoV-2).

“This study reveals a distinct lineage of HKU5-CoVs in bats that efficiently use human ACE2 and underscores their potential zoonotic risk,” the authors wrote in the summary.

Zoonotic diseases can be spread from animals to humans. Picture: Max Mason-Hubers

Zoonotic disease is an infectious disease that is transmitted between species from animals to humans.

The researchers are from various institutes and universities in China, including Wuhan, Guangzhou and Beijing.

Upon reporting the discovery, the South China Morning Post highlighted the lead contact for the study, Zheng-Li Shi, was a leading virologist known as “batwoman” due to her extensive research on bat coronaviruses, and was best known for her work at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The Wuhan Institute of Virology has been at the centre of the theory that the Covid-19 pandemic was started from a lab leak. Picture: Hector Retamal / AFP

The institute has been at the centre of the theory that the Covid-19 pandemic was started from a lab leak, but the institute has denied the virus came from their lab.

There is still no consensus on how Covid-19 started.

After years of no conclusion, in January, the US’ Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) said it now believed the Covid-19 pandemic “more likely” emerged from a lab than from nature.

The US stock market was taking a hammering on Friday (Saturday morning AEST) as concerns about an economic slowdown and the impact of Donald Trump’s policies grow.

But according to Bloomberg, some investors were spooked by reports coming out of China about the virus.