Since coronavirus first appeared , end 2019 , four half million people died , countless suffered , whole economies upended , schools shuttered.Why ? Did virus jump animal first human host , patient zero ? Or , suspect , catastrophe result laboratory accident Wuhan , city eleven million people central China ? Kristian Andersen , infectious-disease expert Scripps Research , San Diego , began tracking virus January , 2020.He found degree contagion scary unusual.Chinese scientists already established belonged genus coronaviruses commonly found bats southern China.It shared eighty per cent genome first SARS , distantly related MERS , another bat coronavirus.This new virus , however , spreading far quickly , reaching least twenty-six countries end month. “ It seemed locked loaded causing pandemic , ” Andersen told .