TY - JOUR AU - Gultom, Mitra AU - Licheri, Matthias AU - Laloli, Laura AU - Wider, Manon AU - Strässle, Marina AU - V’kovski, Philip AU - Steiner, Silvio AU - Kratzel, Annika AU - Thao, Tran Thi Nhu AU - Probst, Lukas AU - Stalder, Hanspeter AU - Portmann, Jasmine AU - Holwerda, Melle AU - Ebert, Nadine AU - Stokar-Regenscheit, Nadine AU - Gurtner, Corinne AU - Zanolari, Patrik AU - Posthaus, Horst AU - Schuller, Simone AU - Vicente-Santos, Amanda AU - Moreira-Soto, Andres AU - Corrales-Aguilar, Eugenia AU - Ruggli, Nicolas AU - Tekes, Gergely AU - von Messling, Veronika AU - Sawatsky, Bevan AU - Thiel, Volker AU - Dijkman, Ronald T1 - Susceptibility of Well-Differentiated Airway Epithelial Cell Cultures from Domestic and Wild Animals to Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome Coronavirus 2 T2 - Emerging Infectious Disease journal PY - 2021 VL - 27 IS - 7 SP - 1811 SN - 1080-6059 AB - Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) has spread globally, and the number of worldwide cases continues to rise. The zoonotic origins of SARS-CoV-2 and its intermediate and potential spillback host reservoirs, besides humans, remain largely unknown. Because of ethical and experimental constraints and more important, to reduce and refine animal experimentation, we used our repository of well-differentiated airway epithelial cell (AEC) cultures from various domesticated and wildlife animal species to assess their susceptibility to SARS-CoV-2. We observed that SARS-CoV-2 replicated efficiently only in monkey and cat AEC culture models. Whole-genome sequencing of progeny viruses revealed no obvious signs of nucleotide transitions required for SARS-CoV-2 to productively infect monkey and cat AEC cultures. Our findings, together with previous reports of human-to-animal spillover events, warrant close surveillance to determine the potential role of cats, monkeys, and closely related species as spillback reservoirs for SARS-CoV-2. KW - animal experimentation ethics KW - coronavirus disease KW - disease reservoirs KW - epidemics KW - epithelial cells KW - outbreaks KW - respiratory infections KW - SARS-CoV-2 KW - severe acute respiratory syndrome 2 KW - viruses KW - whole genome sequencing KW - zoonoses DO - 10.3201/eid2707.204660 UR - https://wwwnc.cdc.gov/eid/article/27/7/20-4660_article ER - End of Reference