France had Covid-19 in November, hospital says after analysis of chest scans
- Study finds person who had the disease 10 weeks earlier than the country detected cases
- Contagion believed to have spread slowly until the end of February before accelerating rapidly
The November case was identified by the hospital’s medical imaging department after carrying out a retrospective study on about 2,500 chest scans performed between November 1 and April 30.
The findings came as the World Health Organisation (WHO) called on countries to investigate pneumonia-like cases from late last year to get a clearer picture of how the new disease spread.
Peter Ben Embarek, a WHO expert in animal diseases, said at a press briefing on Friday that the coronavirus that causes Covid-19 originates or spreads in bats and can spread among cats, although it remains unclear which animal may have transmitted the disease to humans, Bloomberg reported.
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The global health body has previously said that establishing the animal of origin is key to preventing a zoonotic disease outbreak happening again. The timeline of the spread of the disease can also provide critical information about the viral genome and how it has evolved, which can be important for developing drugs to combat it.
In France, some cases were already in circulation in November, said Michel Schmitt, chief doctor of the medical imaging department at Albert Schweitzer Hospital in the town of Colmar in Alsace, near the border with Germany.