I agree with this.Pattern-chaser wrote: ↑April 8th, 2020, 8:28 amWikipedia is, at best, dubious about this so-called practice. Other articles describe how this happens, but always in some far-away country that someone wishes to portray as being barbaric. It's against the law in China, and in many other places too. Wildlife is now fairly well protected across the world, with only animals long-established as food animals being bred in captivity for consumption. And the latter, when we get right down to the mechanics of raising animals for meat, is about as horrific as it gets.
China was civilised when the rest of us were still living in caves and hitting each other with clubs. Since then, they have behaved as well as most other national populations of humans do. I.e. badly, many would say with barbarism. Armadillos have been eaten in Central America, and also in the US following the Great Depression. What you consider normal food, I might be appalled at. And vice versa, of course.
CoViD19 could have emerged in an American intensive chicken-factory, or accidentally from a biological weapons centre, if such things existed, which of course they don't, as my government assures me they don't.... Pigs are also a possibility, especially when raised in intensive factories. Remember "bird flu" (chickens) and "swine flu"? Anti-Chinese hate-speech does harm, but no good that I can see.
It's amusing to note the glee with which the racists and veganazis point the finger at the dirty Chinese.
Viruses are in constant mutation. We all know that viruses such as the flu virus are continually changing each year keeping the vaccine producers tearing out their hair. The virus achieves these annual changes without the help of any animals in the chain of infection. And there is nothing special about the zoonotic practice of viruses that would make either a more virulent, nor a more infectious strain. Luckily such an event is remarkably rare since most mutations lead to the death of the virus.
There is no more danger in a meat market than there is spending time on an over-crowded bus, train or cinema.
What has been interesting in microbiology over the last few decades is the understanding the the microbial world is far more promiscuous in its ability to collect random bits of DNA/RNA to incorporate new systems.
But people want an easy tag to point to new strains, and there are those whose political interests would seek to mobilise their prejudices.