Reports of 'strange pneumonia' in Italy as early as November 2019 predate official COVID-19 cases—both in Italy and China.
In a recent NPR interview, Giuseppe Remuzzi, director of Milan's Mario Negri Institute for Pharmacological Research, shared accounts from doctors in northern Italy. They described 'very strange, very serious cases of pneumonia, mainly affecting elderly patients' in December—and even last November.
These revelations suggest a virus may have circulated in Lombardy before COVID-19 was identified in Italy. Chinese state media quickly highlighted the story, claiming the disease might have emerged on the Italian peninsula before hitting China.
Responding to Daily Mail inquiries, Professor Remuzzi clarified: There's no scientific evidence linking those northern Italy pneumonias to SARS-CoV-2. Genetic studies, however, leave him 'certain' the virus originated in China before global spread.
While no proof ties November's Italian cases to COVID-19, the virus likely emerged in China far earlier than initially reported—possibly due to numerous asymptomatic carriers, per Remuzzi.
Recent reports indicate 'patient zero' was treated in Wuhan on November 17, 2019. By year's end, China had 266 confirmed cases.
Globally, over 537,000 cases and 24,000 deaths were confirmed at the time of reporting. If the virus spread silently earlier, the real impact could be significantly higher.
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