Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
Review
. 2020 Jun 30;9(7):529.
doi: 10.3390/pathogens9070529.

Evidence for SARS-CoV-2 Infection of Animal Hosts

Ahmed S Abdel-Moneim  1   2 , Elsayed M Abdelwhab  3
Affiliations
Review

Evidence for SARS-CoV-2 Infection of Animal Hosts

Ahmed S Abdel-Moneim et al. Pathogens. .

Abstract

COVID-19 is the first known pandemic caused by a coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, which is the third virus in the family Coronaviridae to cause fatal infections in humans after SARS-CoV and MERS-CoV. Animals are involved in the COVID-19 pandemic. This review summarizes the role of animals as reservoirs, natural hosts and experimental models. SARS-CoV-2 originated from animal reservoir, most likely bats and/or pangolins. Anthroponotic transmission has been reported in cats, dogs, tigers, lions and minks. As of now, there is no a strong evidence for natural animal-to-human transmission or sustained animal-to-animal transmission of SARS-CoV-2. Experimental infections conducted by several research groups have shown that monkeys, hamsters, ferrets, cats, tree shrews, transgenic mice and fruit bats were permissive, while dogs, pigs and poultry were resistant. There is an urgent need to understand the zoonotic potential of different viruses in animals, particularly in bats, before they transmit to humans. Vaccines or antivirals against SARS-CoV-2 should be evaluated not only for humans, but also for the protection of companion animals (particularly cats) and susceptible zoo and farm animals.

Keywords: COVID-19; Coronaviridae; SARS-CoV-2; animal modeling; bats; interspecies transmission; pandemic; pets; viral zoonosis; zoo animals.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

The authors declare no conflict of interest

Figures

Figure 1
Figure 1
SARS-COV-2 and animal hosts.
See this image and copyright information in PMC

Comment in

  • The enigmatic COVID-19 pandemic.
    Bhatia R, Abraham P. Bhatia R, et al. Indian J Med Res. 2020 Jul & Aug;152(1 & 2):1-5. doi: 10.4103/ijmr.IJMR_3639_20. Indian J Med Res. 2020. PMID: 32893843 Free PMC article. No abstract available.

References

    1. ICTV Coronaviridae. [(accessed on 22 June 2020)]; Available online: https://talk.ictvonline.org/ictv-reports/ictv_9th_report/positive-sense-....
    1. Banerjee A., Kulcsar K., Misra V., Frieman M., Mossman K. Bats and coronaviruses. Viruses. 2019;11:41. doi: 10.3390/v11010041. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Milek J., Blicharz-Domanska K. Coronaviruses in avian species—Review with focus on epidemiology and diagnosis in wild birds. J. Vet. Res. 2018;62:249–255. doi: 10.2478/jvetres-2018-0035. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Cui J., Li F., Shi Z.L. Origin and evolution of pathogenic coronaviruses. Nat. Rev. Microbiol. 2019;17:181–192. doi: 10.1038/s41579-018-0118-9. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Saif L.J. Animal coronaviruses: What can they teach us about the severe acute respiratory syndrome? Rev. Sci. Tech. 2004;23:643–660. doi: 10.20506/rst.23.2.1513. - DOI - PubMed