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It now appears the virus was in circulation long before we initially thought. A swab taken from a child in Italy in November of last year has tested positive for SARS CoV2. https://www.google.com/amp/s/www.repubblica.it/cronaca/2020/12/09/news/un_bambino_di_milano_di_4_anni_aveva_il_coronavirus_il_21_novembre_2019-277624585/amp/
And if this swab from Nov. 21 has tested positive, it means he was exposed around mid-November. He and his family hadn’t traveled.
Correction, he became ill Nov. 21 and was swabbed on December 5 after going to the emergency room. If he was ill on the 21st, they’re surmising he was exposed around 5 days prior.
The research letter has also been published at the CDC. "We describe the earliest evidence of SARS-CoV-2 RNA in a patient in Italy, ≈3 months before Italy’s first reported COVID-19 case." https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/27/2/20-4632_article
"These findings, in agreement with other evidence of early COVID-19 spread in Europe, advance the beginning of the outbreak to late autumn 2019."
The picture that emerges from retroactive testing is curiouser and curiouser. Recall that they discovered community spread in Washington after re-testing swabs taken for the flu. https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/10/us/coronavirus-testing-delays.html
And it was discovered that the first known case in France was at least in December. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-52526554
Waste water studies have also added data points to the timeline: https://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-53106444
Back to the news from Italy, one of the authors of the study, Mario Raviglione, says: "the explosion seen in Northern Italy at the end of February is completely in line with an infection that had already been in circulation for weeks or months." https://www.repubblica.it/cronaca/2020/12/09/news/un_bambino_di_milano_di_4_anni_aveva_il_coronavirus_il_21_novembre_2019-277624585/
