A worthwhile read:
https://www.viva.org.uk/blog/only-dress-rehearsalExtract:
Of course, coronavirus didn't originate like this but is thought to have come from one of China's ?wet? seafood markets where caged animals are also bought and slaughtered to order. I really can't face describing it in any greater detail but up to 100 different species of wild creatures can be on offer, from pythons to baby deer, bats to civet cats, chickens and wolf cubs ? yes wolf cubs. But before we be too righteous, look in any posh butchers in the right season and you?ll see a whole menagerie of wild animals hanging up ? hares and rabbits, pheasants and partridge, muntjac deer and ducks.
It is thought that this new coronavirus spread from bats to pangolins and no one could possibly have predicted that, could they? Well, no ? unless you discount the outbreak of SARS, another coronavirus that appeared in China in 2004, which infected some 8,000 people and killed 774. The source? Civet cats, which again are thought to have picked the virus up from bats!