Detection of Live Virus in COVID-19 Patient Feces Suggests Possible New Transmission Route

[Image source=EPA Yonhap News]

[Asia Economy Reporter Cha Min-young] Live virus has been detected in the feces of severe COVID-19 patients. This is seen as a significant achievement as it suggests the possibility of a new infection transmission route.

The laboratory at the Fifth Affiliated Hospital of Zhongshan University in Guangdong Province, led by Zhong Nanshan, a top authority on respiratory diseases in China and an academician of the Chinese Academy of Engineering, isolated the COVID-19 virus from patient stool samples, South Plus reported on the 13th.

Zhao Jinchun, deputy director of the National Key Laboratory of Respiratory Diseases, said at a Guangdong provincial government briefing, "This discovery is not accidental. Today, Academician Li Ranjian's team also made a similar finding."

He added, "The presence of live COVID-19 virus in patient feces suggests the possibility of a new transmission route for the virus. However, whether it can cause human-to-human transmission requires further study."

Mi Feng, spokesperson for the National Health Commission, said at the briefing, "Isolating the virus from feces does not mean there has been a change in the main transmission routes. Transmission still primarily occurs through respiratory droplets and contact," attempting to dispel concerns about a new transmission route.

He explained that some patients exhibit gastrointestinal symptoms such as diarrhea, and positive nucleic acid test results or virus isolation from patient fecal samples "indicate that the virus can replicate in the digestive tract."

As the COVID-19 virus has been repeatedly found in feces, concerns about fecal-oral transmission are growing. Fecal-oral transmission refers to the spread of the virus from a patient's feces to another person's mouth through hands or food.