Yes, it has abundant animal reservoirs. The fact you're not aware of this suggests that you are lacking some essential background info, which would explain why you are so myopically characterizing my attitude as "defeatist" rather than "obviously true".
Here's just one study: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8002747/
> There is intriguing evidence that farmed mink infections (acquired from humans) have led to infection of other farm workers in turn, with a recent outbreak of a mink variant in humans in Denmark
Now on to the "defeatist" point:
> They said it was completely infeasible to eradicate smallpox, but we did – because the people actually eradicating smallpox knew how to do it.
Smallpox had no known animal or reservoirs. Compared to the SARS-2 vaccines, smallpox vaccines at the time of eradication were far more effective.
Again, you clearly lack the most rudimentary understanding of this topic. I'm not saying that as an attack but rather as a statement of fact. I would suggest starting with the Wikipedia page on the topic:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eradication_of_infectious_dise...
> The targeting of infectious diseases for eradication is based on narrow criteria, as both biological and technical features determine whether a pathogenic organism is (at least potentially) eradicable. The targeted pathogen must not have a significant non-human (or non-human-dependent) reservoir (or, in the case of animal diseases, the infection reservoir must be an easily identifiable species, as in the case of rinderpest). This requires sufficient understanding of the life cycle and transmission of the pathogen. An efficient and practical intervention (such as a vaccine or antibiotic) must be available to interrupt transmission.
Reading even just the intro paragraphs of that article should make it abundantly clear why SARS-2 cannot and will not be eradicated.
Oh, and BTW, even if we did eradicate it, which we can't, it would still exist in the bioweapon labs of every major country in the world. All it would take is one bad actor intentionally releasing it, or alternatively an accidental lab leak (which has happened with SARS-1, and SARS-2 is even easier to leak). Again, you simply haven't thought this through.
That's “non-zero”; not the same thing as abundant. How do you even know R>1? I'd say “found in wild animals” is the standard for “abundant animal reservoirs”; that's “some animals can catch it from humans” which we already know.
> Smallpox had no known animal or reservoirs.
Smallpox had cases in practically undocumented people. The last few smallpox infections were stamped out by pre-emptive vaccinations of everyone found in the vicinity; that doesn't require the subjects to be human in principle, even if they were in this case.
I maintain we could do it.
> Oh, and BTW, even if we did eradicate it, which we can't, it would still exist in the bioweapon labs of every major country in the world.
Fully-general argument for never bothering to eradicate any disease! Congratulations; I literally cannot rebut this point. All disease eradication is pointless. (By the way, Earth's only got another ~2 billion years of habitability left. Let's just roll over and die now.)
I literally linked you a study that alleged that the virus jumped back from minks to humans. There's far more studies on the animal reservoirs, I just don't feel like doing an exhaustive literature review for the purposes of this subthread. I would strongly encourage you to start researching it since you apparently don't seem to be aware of the fact that zoos around the country are vaccinating their animals against COVID, etc. (Which BTW I disagree with but unless you want to argue that they're just vaccinating them for no reason surely that implies that they're getting infected)
There's literally mountains of evidence for you to go look at
> Smallpox had cases in practically undocumented people. The last few smallpox infections were stamped out by pre-emptive vaccinations of everyone found in the vicinity; that doesn't require the subjects to be human in principle, even if they were in this case.
Okay, good luck vaccinating not just the entire global human population but also virtually every mammal out there. Good luck chasing down the smaller rodents. Better not miss a single spot!
> I maintain we could do it.
Again, we can't. We can't even get close with our current capabilities. I agree there's a hypothetical universe where with teleportation and an infection-blocking vaccine - neither of which we have - as well as some sort of all-seeing eye, we could do it.
I understand that. But unless each infected mink infects (on average) more than one healthy mink, mink populations are not reservoirs. (You don't need much animal-to-human transmission for it to count as a reservoir, so that's an almost irrelevant point and I don't know why you're focusing on it.)
> Good luck chasing down the smaller rodents. Better not miss a single spot!
They didn't eradicate smallpox by vaccinating every human. I'd encourage you to look it up… maybe start at that Wikipedia page you linked me?
We know SARS-CoV-2 is abundant in humans, and we know it's related to viruses with abundant animal reservoirs, but do we know that SARS-CoV-2 has abundant animal reservoirs? I wasn't aware that it did, and I wouldn't expect it to have.
And… what kind of a defeatist attitude is that? They said it was completely infeasible to eradicate smallpox, but we did – because the people actually eradicating smallpox knew how to do it.
> You cannot possibly honestly make this statement in good faith,
Citation needed. You've selected an apparently arbitrary standard for evidence, concluded that nothing you're aware of meets it, and therefore that nobody can possibly make a certain claim… but I note you're certainly not as stringent in your requirements for claiming the opposite.