In January 2020, the World Health Organization (WHO) temporarily named the new virus as the 2019 novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV). However, on February 11th it was definitively named SARS-CoV-2 and the disease caused by this virus was named ‘Coronavirus Disease 2019’. Michael Day, Mary Marcondes and Shane Ryan Mike Lappin at WSAVA provide practical advice on COVID-19 and its impact on animals, suggesting that there is no evidence that a specific animal host is a virus reservoir.