Dept Refutes Claims Coronavirus Originated in Thailand

Animals Sold in a Shop at Chatuchak Market

        Bangkok, Thailand (Feb. 25) – The Department of National Parks, Wildlife and Plant Conservation has denied claims Wednesday that Covid-19 pathogen, first discovered in Wuhan, China, came from Thailand and found that the conjuncture was untrue.

        The department was responding to Denmark's daily newspaper “Politiken” that promulgated an article earlier this week, asking whether Chatuchak Market was indeed the source of the pathogen.

        The article alluded to Danish epidemiologist Thea Kolsen Fischer, who was on a recent WHO fact-finding mission to China, as saying that Southeast Asia could be the source of the pathogen, the department said.

        The department had randomly examined all types of animals, both local and imported, sold at Chatuchak Market and had not discovered any creatures stricken with coronavirus as cited, The department’s director general said Wednesday.

        On March 19, 2020, the department conducted medical inspection process, showing no signs of the new coronavirus, on animals at the market.

        Additionally, the department responded to a previously published Russia's Sputnik news agency’s article, suggesting a similar strain of the pathogen found in bats that matched the one that causes Covid-19 in Thailand.

        The director of the Emergency Disease and Health Hazards Control Division, Dr Chawetsan Namwat, under the Department of Disease Control Wednesday agreed the pathogen, discovered in bats, couldn’t be transmitted to humans. Some information is applied from Bangkok Post.