[djsumdog]

You mean SARS-CoV2, that's the virus. How would they be able to detect it? Would they even know what they were looking for? Would CoV2 trigger the same tests as SARS1 (for non-PCR tests)?

[zachguo]

Hospitals are obligated to report to the CDC once they discover pneumonia caused by an unknown virus that can transmit from human to human. SARS or COVID is just a name scientists gave to the sequenced virus.

[theli0nheart]

This is a nit, but SARS and COVID aren't the names of the respective viral agents; they're the names for the diseases that the viruses cause.

The virus that causes SARS is called SARS-CoV, and the virus that causes COVID-19 is SARS-CoV-2

[objektif]

If you don't know then you don't have to report. I don't think initially they knew that human to human transmission was possible.