Expert in veterinary medicine warns about the unknown susceptibility of farm animals to the Covid-19 virus.

"And though some pigs have been able to get COVID-19 in lab studies, it does not appear that they can catch or spread the virus very easily, said Scott Kenney, an assistant professor of veterinary preventive medicine at The Ohio State University College of Food, Agricultural, and Environmental Sciences (CFAES). 'There are a lot of unknowns,' Kenney said."

https://www.ocj.com/2020/08/livestock-and-covid-19/

Rabbits are susceptible to SARS-CoV-2, but we still don't really know about pigs

"Transmission of severe acute respiratory coronavirus-2 (SARS-CoV-2) between livestock and humans is a potential public health concern. We demonstrate the susceptibility of rabbits to SARS-CoV-2, which excrete infectious virus from the nose and throat upon experimental inoculation. Therefore, investigations on the presence of SARS-CoV-2 in farmed rabbits should be considered."

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.08.27.263988v1.full.pdf

Pigs carry a low risk of infection with the Covid-19 virus.

Genomic analysis reveals many animal species may be vulnerable to SARS-CoV-2 infection

By Lisa Howard, UC Davis

"About 40 percent of the species potentially susceptible to SARS-CoV-2 are classified as "threatened" by the International Union for Conservation of Nature and may be especially vulnerable to human-to-animal transmission. The study was published Aug. 21 in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences."
https://medicalxpress.com/news/2020-08-genomic-analysis-reveals-animal-species.html

The study:
Broad host range of SARS-CoV-2 predicted by comparative and structural analysis of ACE2 in vertebrates
"The novel severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) is the cause of COVID-19, a major pandemic that threatens millions of human lives and the global economy. We identified a large number of mammals that can potentially be infected by SARS-CoV-2 via their ACE2 proteins. This can assist the identification of intermediate hosts for SARS-CoV-2 and hence reduce the opportunity for a future outbreak of COVID-19. Among the species we found with the highest risk for SARS-CoV-2 infection are wildlife and endangered species. These species represent an opportunity for spillover of SARS-CoV-2 from humans to other susceptible animals. Given the limited infectivity data for the species studied, we urge caution not to overinterpret the predictions of the present study."
https://www.pnas.org/content/early/2020/08/20/2010146117

New contradictory study of pigs and SARS-CoV-2 has a whiff of politics about it.

Susceptibility of swine cells and domestic pigs to SARS-CoV-2
 David A. Meekins,a Igor Morozova, Jessie D. Trujilloa, Natasha N.
Gaudreaulta, Dashzeveg Bolda, Bianca L. Artiagaa, Sabarish V. Indrana,
Taeyong Kwona, Velmurugan Balaramana, Daniel W. Maddena, Heinz
Feldmannb, Jamie Henningsona, Wenjun Maa,c, Udeni B. R. Balasuriyad,
and Juergen A. Rich

"In the current study, we determined the ability of SARS-CoV-2 to (i) replicate in porcine cell lines, (ii) establish infection in domestic pigs via experimental oral/intranasal/intratracheal inoculation, and (iii) transmit to co-housed naive sentinel pigs. SARS-CoV-2 was able to replicate in two different porcine cell lines with cytopathic effects."

But they conclude: "Pigs are therefore unlikely to be significant carriers of SARS-CoV-2 and are not a suitable pre-clinical animal model to study SARS-CoV-2 pathogenesis or efficacy of respective vaccines or therapeutic."

https://www.biorxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.08.15.252395v1.full.pdf

Is this study trustworthy? Do we need a second opinion? 

There are plenty of American labs that could begin testing pigs for Covid-19

Could Labs That Test Livestock Ease COVID Testing Backlog for People [and pigs]? Well … Maybe

https://khn.org/news/giroir-says-labs-that-test-livestock-could-ease-the-covid-testing-backlog-for-people-well-maybe/

Mother Jones: As for SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus causing the current COVID-19 pandemic, a study released in June by Chinese researchers found that pigs are at least theoretically susceptible: They have lung and kidney cells that can be invaded by this particular pathogen. But laboratory attempts to infect pigs with it have so far not succeeded. “Given that the COVID-19 pandemic is still progressing and SARS-CoV-2 strains are constantly evolving,” they wrote, “we need to keep monitoring and evaluating the possibility of pigs to become intermediate hosts” of the pathogen. Gray finds the prospect of hog-adapted SARS-CoV-2 daunting. As they do for flu, pigs could emerge as what disease researchers call a “reservoir” for the pathogen—a large host population that keeps the pathogen circulating, giving it more opportunity to infect people. “My chief concern is that the current SARS-CoV-2 virus adapts to commercial hogs, becomes amplified in them, and causes widespread infections, increasing the risk of the virus moving from the pigs to infect humans who have not been previously infected,” he said. He expressed an even darker possibility: The “remote chance” that if it does manage to enter the pig population, it could mutate into something different, yet another “novel coronavirus” that would require a whole new scramble for a vaccine.

Source: Tom Philpott in Mother Jones

https://www.motherjones.com/food/2020/08/industrial-hog-farms-are-breeding-the-next-pandemic/

Coronavirus ping pong between pigs and humans: is an infection reverting back from infected pigs conceivable? The Corona Triangle Part II: Technical Report

 
 
Immo Fiebrig • Larissa Bombardi • Pablo Nepomuceno
 
 
Introduction
Within the last three months, the international press has reported several cases of slaughterhouse workers infected with COVID-19. According to the news, many of these slaughterhouses seem to be some sort of super-spreading hot spot.
 
Three countries - the United States, Germany and Brazil - drew the attention of the authors, because of their own nationalities and/or because of the representation that these countries have in the world’s production and export of pork. These countries will therefore be the focus of this report.
 

Spatial correlation between COVID-19 and pork production
For the three countries in question, the USA, Germany and Brazil, the maps that we present below indicate a salient spatial correlation between the areas with a large presence of mass pig husbandry and/or slaughterhouses and those in which there is a high rate of population infected by COVID-19. 

Full report coming soon