[taxicabjesus]

One speculation I've read is that Australian/Japan/New Zealand's very-bad 2019 flu season was SARS-CoV-2 before it could be diagnosed. My understanding is that most cases of "flu" are suspected, not laboratory-confirmed.

Just found this October 4, 2019 NY Times story: Australia Just Had a Bad Flu Season. That May Be a Warning for the U.S., https://www.nytimes.com/2019/10/04/health/flu-australia-amer...

From this NY times article: "This year’s Australian outbreak began in April [2019], two months earlier than usual, and persisted into October."

COVID-19 cases in the US probably started November-ish. COVID-19 was found in US blood samples from December 2019.

I had a day with an odd headache sometime around December 2019 or January 2020. I suspect I had a case of #EarlyCovid. Lots of other people in North America were super-sick in November/December 2019 and January 2020. Others have been using the hashtag for longer than I: https://twitter.com/search?q=%23EarlyCovid

Edit: At least 4 downvotes in 16 minutes. This indicates many of you do not believe SARS-CoV-2 could have been spreading before it was isolated in Wuhan China in December 2019, or that I and many others might have had a case of non-diagnosed SARS-CoV-2 before tests became available in the US in March 2020.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_COVID-19_pande...

"A September 2020 review noted "The possibility that the COVID-19 infection had already spread to Europe at the end of last year is now indicated by abundant, even if partially circumstantial, evidence", including pneumonia case numbers and radiology in France and Italy in November and December." - https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline_of_the_COVID-19_pande...

What does it mean if the COVID-19 timeline is wrong?

[viraptor]

While not impossible, there are a few things that I think would need good explanations:

- labs would get more flu swabs which test negative - there would be enough globally to make someone suspicious

- why did we see only one strain of covid initially if it was already spreading early (and as I understand it the strain hierarchy always points to the Wuhan one on top)

- we haven't seen the cases drop completely without special measures in any country (there's a drop in summer, but only partial) - why was Australia pretty much covid free initially with all the assumed 2019 cases?

[taxicabjesus]

1. Flu cases numbers are estimates. Flu cases have disappeared, presumably on account of everyone getting SARS-CoV-2 instead.

https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/index.html https://www.cdc.gov/flu/about/burden/faq.htm https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/comparing-...

2. Figuring out if a person has a strain requires genetic sequencing of samples that tested positive for generic COVID-19. I don't know when this became possible.

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/how-are-covid-19-v...

3. Some populations are healthier than others. I think 'Special measures' are mostly theater.

[viraptor]

> 1. Flu cases numbers are estimates. Flu cases have disappeared, presumably on account of everyone getting SARS-CoV-2 instead.

The flu statistics are estimates based on a few sources - some including testing. There's still a number of swabs from people with flu symptoms being tested. In the proposed situation, the labs would register a large number of tests for flu coming back negative for both flu and common cold. There are people whose job is to notice trends like that.

2. It doesn't matter when the testing became possible. If multiple strains existed before, we'd likely see some "sibling" strains and common ancestors to the Wuhan and X strain. Both the siblings and X seem to be absent.

3. If you're ready to put the fall of infections right as the lockdown were implemented to a coincidence / healthy population, then I'm not sure it's even worth discussing the other aspects.

Btw, the context here is Australia. (You posted links to CDC)

[taxicabjesus]

I was just found a tab on my phone with this CNN article:

CNN Exclusive: WHO Wuhan mission finds possible signs of wider original outbreak in 2019 - https://www.cnn.com/2021/02/14/health/who-mission-china-intl...

The investigators found evidence of 13 virus strains in Wuhan in December 2019:

> As a result, they were able to gather for the first time 13 different genetic sequences of the SARS-COV-2 virus from December 2019. The sequences, if examined with wider patient data in China across 2019, could provide valuable clues about the geography and timing of the outbreak before December.

> ...

> Prof. Edward Holmes, a virologist at the University of Sydney, in Australia, said: "As there was already genetic diversity in SARS-CoV-2 sequences sampled from Wuhan in December 2019, it is likely that the virus was circulating for a while longer than that month alone."

The point I'm trying to make here is that there's certainly a lot of facets of the pandemic that haven't been properly explained.

[projectileboy]

I’m not totally sure why you’re being downvoted, it’s an interesting question. My niece in Seattle had a very bad “flu” for about three weeks early last year, well before the initial wave in the Pacific Northwest. I hope we will eventually learn a bit more about how and where this started and how and where it spread, so that we can do a better job next time. (Putting aside the obvious ways the US and other parts of the world chose to deny reality, there still is much to learn.)

[tharkun__]

I can completely believe this. Unfortunately we can't prove any of this but personally I think my team was at least exposed to Covid in early 2020 as well. We had a guy in our (small) team room out sick from Thursday to Monday and he reported being 'floored' and coughing his lungs out. His SO got the same a few days after. Nobody else really got sick but given the close quarters and what we know about aerosol spread and incubation periods now, I think we were practically bathing in virus soup.

[flukus]

> One speculation I've read is that Australian/Japan/New Zealand's very-bad 2019 flu season was SARS-CoV-2 before it could be diagnosed

This is complete BS on par with 5G conspiracies. We know how quickly this virus spreads if left unchecked and someone would have noticed the excessive amount of dead bodies piling up. We also know it spreads very well via air travel, it would have been all over the world not long after it was spreading wildly across Australia. And if we had some sort of immunity already from a bad flu season, then why did it spread so fast when we did have outbreaks? There's absolutely no way this virus was spreading in Australia in mid-2019.

The idea it was in Australia earlier is created by people that don't like the solutions we used so they work backwards to create other explanations, quite often paired with a large dose of American Exceptionalism. Things Australia did that worked: Border closures (intenrally and externally), contact tracing, masks and lockdowns.

[taxicabjesus]

(note to self: comment above quickly went to -4, then saw at +2, now at -1, so at least 14 votes.)