1. It's unlikely that this coronavirus was caused by the consumption of bats. It is more likely that it was transmitted through an intermediate host such as pangolin.

2. A very small minority of people in China consume exotic food not because they are cheap, but because they are more expensive and were considered prestigious.

3. There is now a very strong pushbacks against this culture from both the Chinese government and the vast majority of the Chinese people.

It's also not actually sound to begin with. MERS was transmitted to humans from camels, which are not exotic at all in the middle east. Livestock frequently interacts with wild animals, and this isn't really preventable, especially against bats. Worse yet, livestock is generally kept in large groups in close proximity to each other, and once slaughtered is distributed quickly and widely. While it doesn't get the same media coverage, it is not that uncommon for diseased meat to make it into the food supply. While meat inspection practices go a long way to help, they for obvious reasons have a hard time dealing with new diseases.

I specifically mentioned that

> Yes, outbreak of zootonic diseases is still possible through widely consumed firm animals (chickens, pigs, or cows). But we can dramatically reduce the risk of next pandemic if we stop eating exotic wild animals like bats, which is not hard to give up.

Washing your hands is not going to stop every single disease on the earth, but it'll reduce the risk. What exactly is the unsound part here?

The idea that a policy attempting to stop the consumption of wild animals would dramatically reduce the risk of a pandemic isn't sound. Most foodborne zoonotic outbreaks come from livestock, particularly in cases of newly developed farmland encroaching on wild animals, and transmission to livestock does not present a significant barrier for a Novel Coronavirus or other pandemic disease. H5N1 for example spreads to humans predominantly via poultry. The Chinese government also already discourages the consumption of such animals, and it is unlikely that further policy would have much impact, and the political effort could be much better spent elsewhere.

It's not a harmful proposal or anything, I just don't think it would have much impact, and it fixates excessively on the particulars of two specific outbreaks.

Yeah, people don't eat bushmeat and from the garbage can because they choose to - they have (or feel they have) no other choice.

Exotic animals are not something poor people eat because they can't afford. It's absolutely the other way around. Exotic meats are mostly consumed by the powerful people as delicacies.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bushmeat https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wildlife_trafficking_and_emerg...

I have no doubt that there are cases of wealthy people consuming exotic meat as a delicacy, but I would bet pound for pound it is largely people in poorer regions without much alternative.

Unfortunately I'm looking for real stats but am having trouble as most of the trade does not keep records, is illegal, etc