Susceptibility of ferrets, cats, dogs, and other domesticated animals to SARS–coronavirus 2

  1. Jianzhong Shi
  2. Zhiyuan Wen
  3. Gongxun Zhong
  4. Huanliang Yang
  5. Chong Wang
  6. Baoying Huang
  7. Renqiang Liu
  8. Xijun He
  9. Lei Shuai
  10. Ziruo Sun
  11. Yubo Zhao
  12. Peipei Liu
  13. Libin Liang
  14. Pengfei Cui
  15. Jinliang Wang
  16. Xianfeng Zhang
  17. Yuntao Guan
  18. Wenjie Tan
  19. Guizhen Wu
  20. Hualan Chen
  21. Zhigao Bu

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Abstract

The severe acute respiratory syndrome–coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) pandemic may have originated in bats, but how it made its way into humans is unknown. Because of its zoonotic origins, SARS-CoV-2 is unlikely to exclusively infect humans, so it would be valuable to have an animal model for drug and vaccine development. Shi et al. tested ferrets, as well as livestock and companion animals of humans, for their susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2 (see the Perspective by Lakdawala and Menachery). The authors found that SARS-CoV-2 infects the upper respiratory tracts of ferrets but is poorly transmissible between individuals. In cats, the virus replicated in the nose and throat and caused inflammatory pathology deeper in the respiratory tract, and airborne transmission did occur between pairs of cats. Dogs appeared not to support viral replication well and had low susceptibility to the virus, and pigs, chickens, and ducks were not susceptible to SARS-CoV-2.

Science , this issue p. 1016 ; see also p. 942

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  1. ScreenIT

    SciScore for 10.1101/2020.03.30.015347: (What is this?)

    Please note, not all rigor criteria are appropriate for all manuscripts.

    Table 1: Rigor

    Institutional Review Board Statementnot detected.
    Randomizationnot detected.
    Blindingnot detected.
    Power Analysisnot detected.
    Sex as a biological variablenot detected.

    Table 2: Resources

    No key resources detected.

    Results from OddPub: We did not detect open data. We also did not detect open code. Researchers are encouraged to share open data when possible (see Nature blog).

    Results from LimitationRecognizer: An explicit section about the limitations of the techniques employed in this study was not found. We encourage authors to address study limitations.

    Results from TrialIdentifier: No clinical trial numbers were referenced.

    Results from Barzooka: We did not find any issues relating to the usage of bar graphs.

    Results from JetFighter: We did not find any issues relating to colormaps.

    Results from rtransparent:
    • Thank you for including a conflict of interest statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • Thank you for including a funding statement. Authors are encouraged to include this statement when submitting to a journal.
    • No protocol registration statement was detected.

    About SciScore

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  2. Version published to 10.1126/science.abb7015
  3. Version published to 10.1101/2020.03.30.015347v1 on bioRxiv