The coronavirus disease (COVID-19), formerly known as the novel coronavirus infection, was first reported in late December 2019 in Wuhan City in China. Many health experts believe that the virus had spread way before it was identified as the culprit for many pneumonia-like diseases. Now, a French doctor says that the coronavirus reached France back in December when it admitted a pneumonia patient into hospital.

The hospital in France identified the country’s earliest-known COVID-19 case on Dec. 27, 2019, as a man who was suspected of having pneumonia but actually had the novel coronavirus. The report means that the virus had reached Europe way before it was first reported on the continent in January.

https://www.news-medical.net/news/20200505/First-French-COVID-19-case-was-in-December.aspx

Dr. Yves Cohen, the head of resuscitation at the Avicenne and Jean Verdier hospitals, retested samples from 24 patients who were treated in December and January. These patients had tested negative for flu before the coronavirus disease even evolved into a pandemic.

The finding raises questions about how the patient contracted the virus and what strain was in France since virologists who studied the main strains of the pathogen said that it did not come directly from China or Italy, and has been spreading undocumented.

The first European country that reported an outbreak of the coronavirus disease was Italy, which was locked down in March in an attempt to contain the spread of the virus, but it was too late. The virus has already spread and caused many infections and deaths. It is also believed that from Italy, the virus has spread to neighboring countries, who also reported a high infection rate, such as Germany, Spain, France, and the United Kingdom.