To be clear: as far as viruses go, this one is pretty mild. It scores a disappointing '2' when it comes to how contagious it is, and its lethality is profoundly underwhelming. I mean, I would expect a Chinese high-grade bioweapon to do better than
this:
https://metro.co.uk/2020/03/22/95-y...est-woman-italy-recover-coronavirus-12438267/
As for how likely it is to emerge from a Chinese food market? Well, likely enough that a Chinese food market is explicitly suggested in a book I have about zoonosis from 2012. More generally speaking China is
the country where you expect this to happen, to the point that when CDC funding was cut it mentioned China first when listing the problematic regions in 2018:
https://globalhealth.duke.edu/media/news/op-ed-odds-devastating-pandemic-just-went
Heck, even ignoring the cultural elements promoting extensive contacts between humans and well-known reservoir animals (some specifically known to be reservoir hosts to
corona viruses!), even if you know nothing about Chinese culture or zoonosis or any of this whatsoever, it would still be your most likely bet: 20% of the worlds population lives in China, they have 15 of the 50 largest metropoles on the planet, most of it is in climates very conducive to viruses (which is also the climate humans tend to appreciate) and so on. I mean, come on: how likely do you think it is that a new corona virus emerges in the same region as another (SARS) did a few years ago. That is not a coincidence, but it is not a conspiracy either.
It is part nature, part
negligence. Mind you, I am not ruling things out definitely, but such conspiracies would be way, way down on my list of explanations.