Charting the animal origins of human diseases like COVID-19 can be difficult and often leads to unexpected discoveries.

There are simply not enough resources available to test most people who are sick in Wisconsin and across the United States.The dilemma is spurring local and regional health systems to increasingly take testing matters into their own hands, a move state officials not only endorse but are actively pursuing.

Over the course of a single historic week, daily life in Wisconsin and across much of the United States ground to a halt as a dangerous new virus arrived in communities across the nation. A flurry of shutdowns raced to keep up with the spread of COVID-19 and the growing realization of its looming human impact.

A serious new respiratory illness is gaining steam around the world, and epidemiologists, virologists and many other scientists are sprinting to learn as much about it as quickly as possible.