India is more crowded and dirty, but do not hear many viruses originating there. I am curious. Anyone knows the answer?

vegetarians? I don’t think they have as many live animal markets. Seems to spread easily if you have those.

That it’s common for people too live in close proximity to pigs and poultry in rural China. New diseases appear when the viruses hopscotch from species to species. The 1918 flu was thought to originate in Kansas for the same reason.

I've wondered myself why these diseases predominately start in China...

And the sheer population size. The more people and livestock you have together, the greater chance of a jump. Poor sanitation makes it worse.

in eating habits?

Lots of pigs and lots of poultry.

People and animals in close quarters under conditions that make it easier for viruses to jump from one host species to another.

https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/articles/2020-03-04/why-so-many-epidemics-originate-in-asia-and-africa

Many Hindus are vegetarian and Muslims eat Hallal meat, very similar to Kosher.

That the rest of us wouldn't eat, but germs get spread around.

Apparently up until 10,000 years ago, humans were cold- and flu-free. Then we started domesticating animals and that's when our troubles began. IIRC, horses gave us the common cold, birds and pigs several strains of flu,and so on.

Moral of the story is that animals eventually extract their revenge when we exploit them for our own purposes, be it for food, beasts of burden, etc.

and I believe they tend to eat each others' feces. They all pass the influenza virus back and forth but are not affected by it. It's the passing back and forth that leads to it evolving so rapidly.

There was a time when European peasants kept their livestock in their homes, and I believe that at least some of the old-time childhood diseases, for example measles, came about when something jumped from cattle to humans.

Really sad. Hopefully it will not mutate further.

It would have had our scientists in China working hand in hand with Chinese scientists to get ahead of this threat. Of course, Trump eliminated all of that.

Covid pandemic already is plenty. We don't need another one.

We have our usual flu outbreak coming up, plus the second coming of COVID-19.

If Mother Nature is trying to cut back on the population of the world, she's doing a pretty good job. Give us a break.

I guess there is nothing more fitting after a hard kick on one ass cheek than a hard kick on the other one.

######

(begin snip)

But researchers of zoonotic diseases — diseases that jump from animals to humans – pinpoint the wet markets in mainland China as particularly problematic for several reasons. First, these markets often have many different kinds of animals – some wild, some domesticated but not necessarily native to that part of Asia. The stress of captivity in these chaotic markets weakens the animals' immune systems and creates an environment where viruses from different species can mingle, swap bits of their genetic code and spread from one species to another, according to biologist Kevin Olival, vice president for research at the EcoHealth Alliance. When that happens, occasionally a new strain of an animal virus gets a foothold in humans and an outbreak like this current coronavirus erupts.

(end snip,.... much more at link)

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/01/31/800975655/why-theyre-called-wet-markets-and-what-health-risks-they-might-pose

But, the problem seems to be a worldwide one.

One thing about China is it has greate scientists and engineers, but a few of them take on a Wild West mentality.

At least they're edible in case of famine.......

Will tRump pay attention to this one?

Our scientists should be there helping out.

They've perfected messages that will send some large portion of dimwits to bleach (or ammonia) bottles, to crowd together in mosh pits and suck each other's, to obfuscate any messages about masks, social distancing, hand-washing, etc.

They've perfected messages to have millions of people in the US to self-destruct.

Who would want the US to self-destruct? And how will trumpf and family make it safely to the USSR? And will their remains ever be found?

It's pandemics and global warming catastrophes all the way down.

We could fix this by quitting fossil fuels and meat.

We could promote realistic sex education and birth control.

We won't.

...and with 8 billion ready made hosts for it.

Saying “it could” jump to humans, means it probably already has. There’s usually about a 3 month lag from them finding something and then admitting it to the world. Great. Just great.

So, I am afraid it could be the case.

It’s probably already spreading there. This is going to be a bad winter.

but I don't think there will be too many humans will be around by then.

We’re going to need them for some time...

This kind of sucks! Hopefully by then we will have a good administration and president, BUT I won't hold my breath.