I am not surprised, knowing that[1]:

> As far back as late November, U.S. intelligence officials were warning that a contagion was sweeping through China’s Wuhan region, changing the patterns of life and business and posing a threat to the population, according to four sources briefed on the secret reporting.

> Concerns about what is now known to be the novel coronavirus pandemic were detailed in a November intelligence report by the military's National Center for Medical Intelligence (NCMI), according to two officials familiar with the document’s contents.

> The report was the result of analysis of wire and computer intercepts, coupled with satellite images. It raised alarms because an out-of-control disease would pose a serious threat to U.S. forces in Asia -- forces that depend on the NCMI’s work.

[1] https://abcnews.go.com/Politics/intelligence-report-warned-c...

The ABC News article was deemed "not correct":

"As a matter of practice the National Center for Medical Intelligence does not comment publicly on specific intelligence matters. However, in the interest of transparency during this current public health crisis, we can confirm that media reporting about the existence/release of a National Center for Medical Intelligence Coronavirus-related product/assessment in November of 2019 is not correct. No such NCMI product exists," Colonel Dr. R. Shane Day, director of the National Center for Medical Intelligence, said.

Quoted here a few paragraphs down:

https://www.cnn.com/2020/04/08/politics/intel-agencies-covid...

It was separately confirmed to be correct two days later by NBC News[1]:

> U.S. spy agencies collected raw intelligence hinting at a public health crisis in Wuhan, China, in November, two current and one former U.S. official told NBC News, but the information was not understood as the first warning signs of an impending global pandemic.

> On Wednesday night, the Defense Department disputed an ABC News report that an "intelligence report" had warned about the coronavirus in November.

> But the current and former officials told NBC News that while no formal assessment was produced in November — and hence no "intelligence product," in the jargon of the spy agencies — there was intelligence that caught the attention of public health analysts and fueled formal assessments that were written in December.

[1] https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/u-s-spy-a...

Talking about Covid, France is one strange outlier. Something is happening with their numbers.

What do you mean?

pvaldes explains this in another Hacker News discussion: see pvaldes post that starts with

"We have a single virus, but it does not behave the same."

in pvaldes profile at:

https://news.ycombinator.com/threads?id=pvaldes

Maybe. More likely a false positive? Hopefully they repeated and followed up with tests from other providers to confirm.

From the article:

> Each sample was retested several times to ensure that there were no errors, he added

According to the published report, it was also done by two different laboratories and staff. Of course the false positive hypothesis can't be excluded, but the radiographies show the characteristic glass-like pattern of this viral pneumonia.

I still think a contaminated sample is more likely, all else being equal. Not saying this is impossible, but would like to see at least a few other cases this early. If this patient had not been to China then there must be some.

And if this turns out to be a true positive then it indicates the virus is so contagious that it spread that far and wide, that quickly, that overall infection must be much more widespread than is thought.

His wife worked together with people from China.