Coronaviruses are positive-sense RNA viruses having an extensive and promiscuous range of natural hosts and affect multiple systems (23, 24). Coronaviruses can cause clinical diseases in humans that may extend from the common cold to more severe respiratory diseases like SARS and MERS (17, 279). The recently emerging SARS-CoV-2 has wrought havoc in China and caused a pandemic situation in the worldwide population, leading to disease outbreaks that have not been controlled to date, although extensive efforts are being put in place to counter this virus (25). This virus has been proposed to be designated/named severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) by the International Committee on Taxonomy of Viruses (ICTV), which determined the virus belongs to the Severe acute respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus category and found this virus is related to SARS-CoVs (26). SARS-CoV-2 is a member of the order Nidovirales, family Coronaviridae, subfamily Orthocoronavirinae, which is subdivided into four genera, viz., Alphacoronavirus, Betacoronavirus, Gammacoronavirus, and Deltacoronavirus (3, 27). The genera Alphacoronavirus and Betacoronavirus originate from bats, while Gammacoronavirus and Deltacoronavirus have evolved from bird and swine gene pools (24, 28, 29, 275).