Bats are the likely zoonotic origin of several coronaviruses (CoVs) that infect humans, including SARS-CoV-1 and SARS-CoV-2, both of which have caused large-scale epidemics. The number of CoVs that are present in an area is strongly correlated with local bat species richness, which in turn is affected by local climatic conditions that drive the geographical distributions of species. Here we show that the southern Chinese Yunnan province, and adjacent regions in Myanmar and Laos, form a global hotspot of climate change-driven increase in bat richness. This region coincides with the proposed spatial origin of bat-borne ancestors of SARS-CoV-1 and SARS-CoV-2. Accounting for an increase in the number of bat-borne CoVs in the order of 100 viruses across the region, climate change may have played an important role in the evolution or transmission of the two viruses.
Shifts in global bat diversity suggest a possible role of climate change in the emergence of SARS-CoV-1 and SARS-CoV-2