With French and Vietnamese colleagues we studied the coronavirus diversity of horseshoe bats (Rhinolophus spp.) in Vietnam. Previous studies have described many coronaviruses related to SARS-CoV (SARSCoVr) in China and only a few coronaviruses related to SARS-CoV-2 (SARSCoV2r) in Yunnan, Cambodia, Laos and Thailand. In our preprint we report the results of several field missions carried out in 2017, 2021 and 2022 across Vietnam during which 1,218 horseshoe bats were sampled. We assembled 38 Sarbecovirus genomes: 26 SARSCoVr from R. thomasi; six SARSCoVr and four SARSCoV2r from R. affinis; and two recombinants of SARSCoVr and SARSCoV2r from R. pusillus, one showing a receptor-binding domain of the Spike protein very similar to SARS-CoV-2. We detected a bat co-infected with four coronaviruses, including two sarbecoviruses. Our phylogeographic analysis suggests a divergent evolution between sarbecoviruses from subtropical northern Vietnam and those from tropical southern Vietnam, emergence of SARS-CoV in horseshoe bats from northern Yunnan and emergence of SARS-CoV-2 in horseshoe bats from southern Yunnan. You can read the preprint on ResearchSquare.
