7.6
Evidence SARS-CoV-2 Emerged From a Biological Laboratory in Wuhan, China
Published April 16, 2020.
1 Abstract
The goal of this document is to examine evidence that may prove that (1) the SARS-CoV-2 virus was present at a biolaboratory in Wuhan, China, and (2) the SARS-CoV-2 virus was introduced into the greater Wuhan population by an infected lab worker or animal. These claims from this point on will be referred to as Claim 1 and Claim 2.
This document does not attempt to provide a concrete conclusion on whether either claim is factually true. Rather, it examines the probability that each claim is true to allow the reader to make his or her own conclusions. While either claim cannot be irrevocably proven true, an attempt has been made to ensure the evidence used to support these claims is as factual as possible.
Furthermore, this document does not attempt to investigate claims that SARS-CoV-2 is a "man-made bioweapon" or whether its release was intentional. See A Note on Biowarfare and "HIV Inserts".
If you would like to see a summarized version of every claim in this document, please see the Conclusion.
Please download and share this document: archive.zip
2 Authors
We are an anonymous group of researchers. We are not affiliated with any company, nation state, or organization. We disavow all racism and violent attacks, including those which are aimed at Asian or Chinese people, and we will continue to disavow them throughout this paper. We are not doing this because we hate China, but because we love the truth.
An earlier version of this document referred to us as "Project E.P.S.T.E.I.N." (Evidence Plausibly Supporting Theories Explaining Infection Naturality). It was intended be a humorous backronym. After receiving feedback from several readers, we have decided to change our name to "Project E" (Evidence) to avoid negative connotations with conspiracy theories. We maintain that this document is still supported by the best evidence we have been able to locate.
The authors of this document claim no conflicts of interest.
Our public key is also available for download: public.pem
3 Correction Policy
As of the current date, April 16, 2020, the source of SARS-CoV-2 remains unknown.
If the scientific community can provide peer reviewed studies that prove that the SARS-CoV-2 spillover event occured "in the wild," i.e. outside of a lab and with no connection to lab researchers, animals, organisms, or other specimen, we will add an addendum to this document highlighting those results.
Studies proving the virus was not "engineered" do not prove the spillover event occured outside of a laboratory. We are not claiming the virus was engineered. They also do not prove that the spillover event did not involve an animal or organism sourced from one of these labs.
We are only interested in the truth.
4 Contribution Policy
We welcome contributions to this document as new factual evidence emerges from the scientific and Internet community as a whole.
In particular, we are always looking for peer reviewed papers and other documents that address, back up, or disprove the claims in this document. All sources must be acceptable under our Sourcing Policy. To get started, simply searching this document for, "We are looking for contributors."
If you think you have such evidence, please submit a pull request.
5 Sourcing Policy
Prefer academic papers over any other source.
All academic papers must be peer reviewed; if they are not, this must be made clear to the reader.
Prefer news articles from prestigious medical or scientific journals such as Nature, the Lancet, Scientific American, etc. over "mainstream" media.
Prefer "mainstream" media news articles over amateur or unproven articles.
If using information from an "amateur" source, cross-check it with "mainstream" media, scientific journals, or academic papers, and use those sources rather than the original source to prove the claim.
Use multiple sources to prove the same claim.
If a source is not in English, use Google Translate to provide English snippets, and make it clear to the reader that a translation tool was used.
All sources must be dated.
All sources subject to change must be archived via https://archive.is.
6 Purpose
Above all, we believe in finding the truth. We would like to investigate all theories that could explain the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 without predefined assumptions on what can or can not be true.
6.1 If We’re Right
We believe in holding the Chinese government accountable for changes in regulations and policies that can prevent another laboratory accident. In particular, we would like to see a nationally unified movement toward transparency so that the world may rest assured in the belief that China will not hide the next pandemic, natural or otherwise, if it occurs under their jurisdiction. It is vitally important that lab safety is taken seriously in all countries to ensure the survival and continued success of the human race.
We do not believe in holding individual lab technicians or employees accountable unless they have demonstrated criminal negligence. In most accidents, procedures and policies are the culprit, not individual people. Punishing one person will not prevent the next person from making the same mistakes; instituting new rules that prevent such mistakes will.
6.2 If We’re Wrong
If our claims are proven false, the next step is to determine the true origin of the outbreak, assuming the evidence that proved our claims false did not do that already.
We believe in holding every government accountable for changes in regulations and policies that can prevent another natural outbreak. Whether these be new food safety standards, stronger enforcement of wildlife trade, mandatory reporting rules or agricultural inspections, we want to see the root cause of the problem addressed so that it may never occur again. COVID-19, lab accident or otherwise, has unleashed incalculable pain upon our world, and we must ensure the conditions that enabled its emergence are left behind to history.
6.3 Either Way
We condemn racist attacks on Asian Americans and Asians, including Chinese people, around the world. They are all innocent.
A secondary goal of this document is to further spread global awareness of the hazards posed by biolaboratories, in particular gain-of-function studies, and proximal location to urban areas.
The American CDC, for example, is a 15 minute drive away from Atlanta Hartsfield Jackson Airport, the "world’s busiest airport every year since 2000.". It, too, houses BSL-4 labs that do work on Ebola, smallpox, and anthrax viruses. We must ensure our leaders and representatives are aware of these hazards and are continuing to take steps, in every country, to nullify the possibility of an outbreak.
We do not believe in the eradication of critical virus research; we simply ask that due dilligence is applied transparently wherever it is performed.
7 Nomenclature
Throughout this document we may use several uncommon phrases or acronyms. When appropriate, we will define them before using them. We will list some of the most important ones here.
Coronavirus: In this context, the SARS-CoV-2 virus. In the real world, there are hundreds of other coronaviruses.
SARS: Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome.
SARS-CoV-1: The original SARS virus that struck China in 2003.
MERS-CoV: Middle East Respiratory Syndrome, a variant of SARS that originated in Saudi Arabia in 2012.
SARS-CoV-2: The current coronavirus resulting in the COVID-19 pandemic.
2019-nCoV: The original name for SARS-CoV-2 before being renamed by the World Health Organization.
COVID-19: (CoronaVirus Infectious Disease 2019) The name of the disease that results from a SARS-CoV-2 viral infection. In severe cases, it leads to fatal pneumonia.
Zoonotic virus: A virus that is capable of spreading from an animal to a human.
Patient Zero: the very first person involved in the spillover event that introduces the virus to humanity. At this time, Patient Zero for SARS-CoV-2 is not widely known, if at all.
And finally, the most important definition you must understand:
Spillover Event: A moment in time in which a zoonotic virus "jumps" from an animal host to a human host.
We believe that a spillover event is the most likely explanation for the introduction of SARS-CoV-2 to the human populace. What we will question is whether this spillover event occured at a market in Wuhan, at a biolaboratory in Wuhan, as a result of interacting with a lab animal from one of these biolaboratories, or somewhere else entirely.
8 Claim 1: Was SARS-CoV-2 Present At A Bio-Laboratory in Wuhan, China?
At this time, it is widely believed that Patient Zero was infected in Wuhan, China with SARS-CoV-2. What is not so certain is where exactly in Wuhan Patient Zero was infected, and how he/she was infected. The competing theories are:
From eating wild animals at the Huanan Seafood Market
From doing work at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which performed gain-of-function research on the original SARS virus
From doing work at the Wuhan Centre for Disease Control, which performed experiments on and housed many bats known for carrying coronaviruses
From somewhere elsewhere entirely; they were not in Wuhan at all
Patient Zero would then go on to spread the infection, likely asymptomatically, to many people before any defensive measures were taken. This would eventually cause the pandemic now known as COVID-19 and resulting worldwide lockdown.
8.1 The Huanan Seafood Market
The seafood market gained prominence after a study in the New England Journal of Medicine referred to it as a possible origin point:
A Novel Coronavirus from Patients with Pneumonia in China, 2019 (January 24, 2020)
Four lower respiratory tract samples, including bronchoalveolar-lavage fluid, were collected from patients with pneumonia of unknown cause who were identified in Wuhan on December 21, 2019, or later and who had been present at the Huanan Seafood Market close to the time of their clinical presentation.
Source: https://www.nejm.org/doi/10.1056/NEJMoa2001017 (archived)
Indeed, as SARS-CoV-2 and the original SARS-CoV-1 are zoonotic viruses (meaning they spread from animals to humans), it is possible someone may have been in close proximity or even eaten an animal containing the virus. This would constitute a spillover event, many of which have occured in the past and resulted in the introduction of new diseases to humanity. So, it is not unprecedented.
However, a later paper from The Lancet reported that many initial patients were not actually exposed to the Huanan Seafood Market in any way:
Clinical features of patients infected with 2019 novel coronavirus in Wuhan, China (January 24, 2020)
27 (66%) patients had direct exposure to Huanan seafood market (figure 1B). Market exposure was similar between the patients with ICU care (nine [69%]) and those with non-ICU care (18 [64%]). The symptom onset date of the first patient identified was Dec 1, 2019. None of his family members developed fever or any respiratory symptoms. No epidemiological link was found between the first patient and later cases. The first fatal case, who had continuous exposure to the market, was admitted to hospital because of a 7-day history of fever, cough, and dyspnoea. 5 days after illness onset, his wife, a 53-year-old woman who had no known history of exposure to the market, also presented with pneumonia and was hospitalised in the isolation ward.
Source: https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30183-5/fulltext (archived)
Because 34% of cases did not have exposure to the market yet were exposed to the virus, it is highly unlikely the market is the origin point of SARS-CoV-2. Indeed, the study confirms "No epidemiological link was found between the first patient and later cases" - meaning that the first patient at the market was not responsible for spreading the virus to other cases.
What is clear is that the spread of the virus began to rise exponentially after it arrived at the Huanan Seafood Market. According to the Wall Street Journal quoting the Chinese Center for Disease Control, the virus was present in "environmental samples" at the market:
Virus Sparks Soul-Searching Over China’s Wild Animal Trade (January 26, 2020)
Health officials took specimens from the site and found evidence of the virus in 33 out of 585 samples, according to the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, or CCDC. The virus had been found not just in people’s bodies, but on wild-meat stalls, Gao Fu, the CCDC director told Chinese state television on Thursday. “We must thus call on everyone not to eat wild animals,” he said. “It is only a matter of time to find out which is the specific animal.”
Source: https://www.wsj.com/articles/virus-sparks-soul-searching-over-chinas-wild-animal-trade-11580055290 (archived)
While Mr. Fu here seems to believe the virus originated from the market, we know from the Lancet study that it is unlikely. So, if SARS-CoV-2 did not originate at the market itself, where could it have come from?
8.2 Suspected Laboratories
The first calls to examine the laboratories began when it emerged that the Wuhan Institute of Virology, China’s only BSL-4 bio-laboratory, was only 8.6 miles away from the seafood market. Additionally, the Wuhan Centre for Disease Prevention & Control is located a mere 2.6 miles away. We can easily confirm this with Google Maps:
Directions from Huanan Seafood Market to Wuhan Institute of Virology, CAS https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Huanan+Seafood+Market,+Fazhan+Avenue,+Jianghan+District,+Wuhan,+Hubei,+China/China,+Wuhan+Institute+of+Virology,+CAS
Directions from Huanan Seafood Market to Wuhan Centres for Disease Prevention & Control https://www.google.com/maps/dir/Huanan+Seafood+Market,+Fazhan+Avenue,+Jianghan+District,+Wuhan,+Hubei,+China/Wuhan+Centres+for+Disease+Prevention+%26+Control
While the simple existence of these laboratories does not make them suspects, their proximity to the Huanan Seafood Market does. In Claim 2 we will prove it is entirely possible, and even likely, that an accident at either of these labs could have resulted in Patient Zero.
For now, let us prove that both of these labs have conducted experiments on the SARS-CoV-1 virus, some of which have resulted in variants of the virus, and may still be holding such viruses today. Furthermore, we will prove both labs have conducted experiments involving SARS-CoV-1 on live animals. The Wuhan Institute of Virology will hereby be referred to as WIV and the Wuhan Centre for Disease Prevention & Control as WHCDC.
8.3 A Note on Biowarfare
This document does not make any attempt to link the work done at these laboratories as part of a "bioweapon" or "bio-warfare" program.
The research that has been conducted in these labs, specifically in regards to peer reviewed papers from the WIV and less documented experiments at the WHCDC, may well have advanced our understanding of virology as a species. The sheer existence of such work does not equate to a "bio-warfare program."
Furthermore, even if these labs are engaging in "bio-warfare" research, depending on the type of research, it would still be permissible under international law:
Biological Weapons Convention
The scope of the BWC’s prohibition is defined in Article 1 (the so-called general purpose criterion). This includes all microbial and other biological agents or toxins and their means of delivery (with exceptions for medical and defensive purposes in small quantities). Subsequent Review Conferences have reaffirmed that the general purpose criterion encompasses all future scientific and technological developments relevant to the Convention. It is not the objects themselves (biological agents or toxins), but rather certain purposes for which they may be employed which are prohibited; similar to Art.II, 1 in the Chemical Weapons Convention (CWC). Permitted purposes under the BWC are defined as prophylactic, protective and other peaceful purposes. The objects may not be retained in quantities that have no justification or which are inconsistent with the permitted purposes.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biological_Weapons_Convention
China, and indeed any country that is a signatory to the BWC, is allowed to develop offensive bioweapons, in "quantities that are consistent with the permitted purposes," as long as the purpose of doing so is to develop defenses against them.
Strategically, it would be a foolish choice to perform illegal bio-warfare research in the most closely monitored, internationally-linked biological lab in China. Western intelligence agencies are obviously aware of its existence, and the Chinese government knows that. Such illegal work, if done at all, is much more likely to be done in confidential military bases and covert labs that are not made known to the public.
In this claim, it is irrelevant whether the research being performed was for bio-warfare purposes or not.
We could not find any direct evidence supporting the theory that SARS-CoV-2 was intentionally released from a laboratory.
8.4 A Note on Bio-Safety Levels
As previously mentioned, the WIV has a BSL-4 lab. The WHCDC also operates BSL-2 labs. What does this mean?
The Bio-Safety Level (BSL), also known as the Pathogen or Prevention level (P) in the European Union, dictates the regulations and requirements present in a bio-laboratory. These precautions are necessary to prevent harm to employees, the people who interact with them, and life as a whole. The BSL of a given laboratory, at least in the United States, limits the type of pathogens it can operate with. For example, Ebola, smallpox, and plague can only be present in BSL-4 environments due to their potential to cause harm. According to both the WHO and CDC, activites relating to SARS-CoV-1 must be performed in at least a BSL-2 lab. For 2019-nCoV (now SARS-CoV-2), the CDC recommends most activities be carried out with "BSL-3 precautions".
The CDC also provides a BSL infographic.
8.5 The Wuhan Institute of Virology, Chinese Academy of Sciences
The WIV has existed for decades; its Wikipedia page lists its formation year as 1956. It was only in 2014 that it finished construction of its BSL-4 lab, making it the only public institution operating a BSL-4 lab in China:
Inside the Chinese lab poised to study world’s most dangerous pathogens (February 22, 2017)
It will focus on the control of emerging diseases, store purified viruses and act as a World Health Organization ‘reference laboratory’ linked to similar labs around the world. “It will be a key node in the global biosafety-lab network,” says lab director Yuan Zhiming.
...
The lab’s first project will be to study the BSL-3 pathogen that causes Crimean–Congo haemorrhagic fever: a deadly tick-borne virus that affects livestock across the world, including in northwest China, and that can jump to people.
Future plans include studying the pathogen that causes SARS, which also doesn’t require a BSL-4 lab, before moving on to Ebola and the West African Lassa virus, which do. Some one million Chinese people work in Africa; the country needs to be ready for any eventuality, says Yuan. “Viruses don’t know borders.”
Source: https://www.nature.com/news/inside-the-chinese-lab-poised-to-study-world-s-most-dangerous-pathogens-1.21487 (archived)
Since its inception, the global biosafety community has had concerns about this particular BSL-4 lab. From the same article:
But worries surround the Chinese lab, too. The SARS virus has escaped from high-level containment facilities in Beijing multiple times, notes Richard Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University in Piscataway, New Jersey. Tim Trevan, founder of CHROME Biosafety and Biosecurity Consulting in Damascus, Maryland, says that an open culture is important to keeping BSL-4 labs safe, and he questions how easy this will be in China, where society emphasizes hierarchy. “Diversity of viewpoint, flat structures where everyone feels free to speak up and openness of information are important,” he says.
Yuan says that he has worked to address this issue with staff. “We tell them the most important thing is that they report what they have or haven’t done,” he says. And the lab’s international collaborations will increase openness. “Transparency is the basis of the lab,” he adds.
Has the WIV ever conducted experiments involving the SARS-CoV-1 virus?
Indeed, it has. In fact, it worked with the SARS virus years before establishing the BSL-4 lab (this, by itself, is fine, as SARS-CoV-1 is not a BSL-4 pathogen).
8.5.1 Paper 1
Difference in Receptor Usage between Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) Coronavirus and SARS-Like Coronavirus of Bat Origin (2007)
A group of SARS-like CoVs (SL-CoVs) has been identified in horseshoe bats. SL-CoVs and SARS-CoVs share identical genome organizations and high sequence identities, with the main exception of the N terminus of the spike protein (S), known to be responsible for receptor binding in CoVs. In this study, we investigated the receptor usage of the SL-CoV S by combining a human immunodeficiency virus-based pseudovirus system with cell lines expressing the ACE2 molecules of human, civet, or horseshoe bat. In addition to full-length S of SL-CoV and SARS-CoV, a series of S chimeras was constructed by inserting different sequences of the SARS-CoV S into the SL-CoV S backbone. Several important observations were made from this study. First, the SL-CoV S was unable to use any of the three ACE2 molecules as its receptor. Second, the SARS-CoV S failed to enter cells expressing the bat ACE2. Third, the chimeric S covering the previously defined receptor-binding domain gained its ability to enter cells via human ACE2, albeit with different efficiencies for different constructs. Fourth, a minimal insert region (amino acids 310 to 518) was found to be sufficient to convert the SL-CoV S from non-ACE2 binding to human ACE2 binding, indicating that the SL-CoV S is largely compatible with SARS-CoV S protein both in structure and in function. The significance of these findings in relation to virus origin, virus recombination, and host switching is discussed.
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2258702/ (archived)
The three most important phrases in this abstract as they relate to SARS-CoV-2 are:
"First, the SL-CoV S was unable to use any of the three ACE2 molecules as its receptor."
"we investigated the receptor usage of the SL-CoV S by combining a human immunodeficiency virus-based pseudovirus system with cell lines expressing the ACE2 molecules of human, civet, or horseshoe bat"
"Third, the chimeric S covering the previously defined receptor-binding domain gained its ability to enter cells via human ACE2"
In layman’s terms:
We found this SARS-like virus ("S") that couldn’t infect human cells.
So, we combined S with parts of HIV, which does infect human cells, to see if this new S could infect human cells.
The new S ("chimeric S") can infect human cells.
We find that WIV was involved in this study in the Materials and Methods section:
Materials and Methods
A MAb against p24 of HIV was generated by the HIV group of the Wuhan Institute of Virology (unpublished results). Rabbit polyclonal antibodies against ACE2 of the bat R. pearsonii (RpACE2) was generated using a recombinant RpACE2 protein expressed in Escherichia coli at our laboratory at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, following standard procedures.
All 10 scientists who are associated with this paper are also associated with the Wuhan Institute of Virology. From the paper’s Author Information tab:
Finally, we would like to highlight this prophetic paragraph in the Discussion section:
Considering the documented observations of coinfection of the same bat species by different CoVs, the same CoVs infecting different bat species (26, 29, 39), the high density of bat habitats, and the propensity for genetic recombination among different CoVs, it is not unreasonable to conclude that bats are a natural mixing vessel for the creation of novel CoVs and that it is only a matter of time before some of them cross species barriers into terrestrial mammal and human populations. The findings presented in this study serve as the first example of host switching achievable for G2b CoVs under laboratory conditions by the exchange of a relatively small sequence segment among these previously unknown CoVs.
The papers referenced in this paragraph are provided below:
26 - Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus-like virus in Chinese horseshoe bats
29 - Bats are natural reservoirs of SARS-like coronaviruses
39 - Prevalence and genetic diversity of coronaviruses in bats from China
In layman’s terms:
Multiple coronaviruses can infect the same bat (coinfection)
Those same viruses can infect different kinds of bats
There’s a lot of bats everywhere
Coronaviruses like to mix their genes together (recombinate)
If two coronaviruses infect the same bat and recombinate, they can potentially result in a novel (never before recognized) coronavirus
It only takes a few changes ("exchange of a relatively small sequence segment") between two coronaviruses to result in a third coronavirus that can infect other animals ("host-switching")
The odds of this happening are pretty good!
Indeed, as we know now, the odds were pretty good. Of course, what we don’t know is whether this spillover event happened in the wild (currently unproven) or in the WIV (this paper proves that they have successfully done it before, in this very location).
8.5.2 Paper 2
WIV didn’t stop researching SARS back in 2007, either. A second paper, from 2015, not only reiterates the first paper’s findings, but outright claims they "synthetically re-derived an infectious full-length SHC014 recombinant virus and demonstrate robust viral replication both in vitro and in vivo."
A SARS-like cluster of circulating bat coronaviruses shows potential for human emergence (2015)
The emergence of severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus (SARS-CoV) and Middle East respiratory syndrome (MERS)-CoV underscores the threat of cross-species transmission events leading to outbreaks in humans. Here we examine the disease potential of a SARS-like virus, SHC014-CoV, which is currently circulating in Chinese horseshoe bat populations. Using the SARS-CoV reverse genetics system, we generated and characterized a chimeric virus expressing the spike of bat coronavirus SHC014 in a mouse-adapted SARS-CoV backbone. The results indicate that group 2b viruses encoding the SHC014 spike in a wild-type backbone can efficiently use multiple orthologs of the SARS receptor human angiotensin converting enzyme II (ACE2), replicate efficiently in primary human airway cells and achieve in vitro titers equivalent to epidemic strains of SARS-CoV. Additionally, in vivo experiments demonstrate replication of the chimeric virus in mouse lung with notable pathogenesis. Evaluation of available SARS-based immune-therapeutic and prophylactic modalities revealed poor efficacy; both monoclonal antibody and vaccine approaches failed to neutralize and protect from infection with CoVs using the novel spike protein. On the basis of these findings, we synthetically re-derived an infectious full-length SHC014 recombinant virus and demonstrate robust viral replication both in vitro and in vivo. Our work suggests a potential risk of SARS-CoV re-emergence from viruses currently circulating in bat populations.
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/26552008 (archived)
Three important definitions to understand this in layman’s terms:
"in vitro" means an experiment using cells (i.e. petri dishes and test tubes)
"in vivo" means an experiment using real, living organisms (i.e. mice)
"chimera virus" means it is a genetic mixture of two separate viruses
Once again, in layman’s terms:
We found a virus in bats called SHC014-CoV that is similar to SARS.
We constructed a chimera virus using SHC014-CoV as a basis that could also infect mice cells.
We found the same virus can infect "human airway cells" and impact them the same way as "epidemic strains of SARS-CoV" in vitro. (paraphrased: "it’s as bad as SARS")
We tested the same virus on real mice ("in vivo"), and found it could infect their lungs.
We tried to fight the virus using antibodies and vaccines that help fight SARS, and couldn’t find anything that helped. ("poor efficacy")
We synthetically cloned this chimera virus and tested it both in vitro and in vivo, and found it works well.
And the tie to WIV, in the Author Information:
Rather than dissect these findings, here is a Nature article describing the controversy over this paper:
Engineered bat virus stirs debate over risky research (November 12, 2015)
But other virologists question whether the information gleaned from the experiment justifies the potential risk. Although the extent of any risk is difficult to assess, Simon Wain-Hobson, a virologist at the Pasteur Institute in Paris, points out that the researchers have created a novel virus that “grows remarkably well” in human cells. “If the virus escaped, nobody could predict the trajectory,” he says.
...
In their paper, the study authors also concede that funders may think twice about allowing such experiments in the future. "Scientific review panels may deem similar studies building chimeric viruses based on circulating strains too risky to pursue," they write, adding that discussion is needed as to "whether these types of chimeric virus studies warrant further investigation versus the inherent risks involved".
Source: https://www.nature.com/news/engineered-bat-virus-stirs-debate-over-risky-research-1.18787 (archived)
At this point, you may notice the list of authors for these two papers are quite similar. You will be able to find many of these authors in our next set of papers. In particular, Dr. Shi Zhengli is a recurring name in every single paper we cite from the WIV (which is to be expected - she is a director at the institute).
8.5.3 Paper 3
Both papers mention the receptor "angiotensin-converting enzyme-2." In Paper 1, WIV took a virus that previous could not bind to ACE2 and modified it slightly to enable it to bind to ACE2 receptors. In Paper 2, they synthetically developed a virus that could do the same thing.
SARS-CoV-1 and SARS-CoV-2 also bind to the ACE2 receptor:
Comparative genetic analysis of the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV/SARS-CoV-2) receptor ACE2 in different populations (February 24, 2020)
The ACE2 gene encodes the angiotensin-converting enzyme-2, which has been proved to be the receptor for both the SARS-coronavirus (SARS-CoV) and the human respiratory coronavirus NL63. Recent studies and analyses indicate that ACE2 could be the host receptor for the novel coronavirus 2019-nCoV/SARS-CoV-21,2. Previous studies demonstrated the positive correlation of ACE2 expression and the infection of SARS-CoV in vitro3,4. A number of ACE2 variants could reduce the association between ACE2 and S-protein in SARS-CoV or NL635. Therefore, the expression level and expression pattern of human ACE2 in different tissues might be critical for the susceptibility, symptoms, and outcome of 2019-nCoV/SARS-CoV-2 infection.
Source: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41421-020-0147-1 (archived)
While it is possible, and even likely, for a SARS-like coronavirus to develop the ability to bind to ACE2 receptors in the wild (as Paper 2 claims), this unfortunately also means we cannot rule out the connection to WIV. If SARS-CoV-2 had bound to different receptors, that would make the contents of these papers less suspicious for the claims at hand.
8.5.4 Paper 4
In an internationally renowned discovery in 2017, the WIV found a cave in Yunnan Province that almost certainly held the first SARS-CoV-1 virus:
Discovery of a rich gene pool of bat SARS-related coronaviruses provides new insights into the origin of SARS coronavirus (November 30, 2017)
In addition, we report the first discovery of bat SARSr-CoVs highly similar to human SARS-CoV in ORF3b and in the split ORF8a and 8b. Moreover, SARSr-CoV strains from this cave were more closely related to SARS-CoV in the non-structural protein genes ORF1a and 1b compared with those detected elsewhere. Recombination analysis shows evidence of frequent recombination events within the S gene and around the ORF8 between these SARSr-CoVs. We hypothesize that the direct progenitor of SARS-CoV may have originated after sequential recombination events between the precursors of these SARSr-CoVs. Cell entry studies demonstrated that three newly identified SARSr-CoVs with different S protein sequences are all able to use human ACE2 as the receptor, further exhibiting the close relationship between strains in this cave and SARS-CoV.
...
Bat samplings were conducted ten times from April 2011 to October 2015 at different seasons in their natural habitat at a single location (cave) in Kunming, Yunnan Province, China. All members of field teams wore appropriate personal protective equipment, including N95 masks, tear-resistant gloves, disposable outerwear, and safety glasses. Bats were trapped and fecal swab samples were collected as described previously [9]. Clean plastic sheets measuring 2.0 by 2.0 m were placed under known bat roosting sites at about 18:00 h each evening for collection of fecal samples. Fresh fecal pellets were collected from sheets early in the next morning. Each sample (approximately 1 gram of fecal pellet) was collected in 1ml of viral transport medium composed of Hank’s balanced salt solution at pH7.4 containing BSA (1%), amphotericin (15 μg/ml), penicillin G (100 units/ml), and streptomycin (50 μg/ml), and were stored at -80°C until processing. Bats trapped for this study were released back into their habitat.
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5708621/ (archived)
Now, it claims that this same exact cave most likely contained the bat host for SARS-CoV-2:
A pneumonia outbreak associated with a new coronavirus of probable bat origin (February 3, 2020)
Full-length genome sequences were obtained from five patients at an early stage of the outbreak. The sequences are almost identical and share 79.6% sequence identity to SARS-CoV. Furthermore, we show that 2019-nCoV is 96% identical at the whole-genome level to a bat coronavirus. Pairwise protein sequence analysis of seven conserved non-structural proteins domains show that this virus belongs to the species of SARSr-CoV.
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We then found that a short region of RNA-dependent RNA polymerase (RdRp) from a bat coronavirus (BatCoV RaTG13)—which was previously detected in Rhinolophus affinis from Yunnan province—showed high sequence identity to 2019-nCoV. We carried out full-length sequencing on this RNA sample (GISAID accession number EPI_ISL_402131). Simplot analysis showed that 2019-nCoV was highly similar throughout the genome to RaTG13 (Fig. (Fig.1c),1c), with an overall genome sequence identity of 96.2%. Using the aligned genome sequences of 2019-nCoV, RaTG13, SARS-CoV and previously reported bat SARSr-CoVs, no evidence for recombination events was detected in the genome of 2019-nCoV. Phylogenetic analysis of the full-length genome and the gene sequences of RdRp and spike (S) showed that—for all sequences—RaTG13 is the closest relative of 2019-nCoV and they form a distinct lineage from other SARSr-CoVs.
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The close phylogenetic relationship to RaTG13 provides evidence that 2019-nCoV may have originated in bats.
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7095418/ (archived)
From the 2017 paper, we know that bat samples have been taken from the cave since 2011. The virus RaTG13, which this paper claims is a 96.2% match with SARS-CoV-2, likely came from samples taken from this cave as well.
When it comes to coronaviruses, a 96.2% match is very, very close. You may have heard the common saying that humans share 96% of their DNA with other primates, such as chimpanzees. While this is true, a virus has a significantly smaller genome (only tens of thousands of base pairs compared to over 6 billion in the human genome).
Importantly, this paper shows that WIV has sampled viruses nearly identical to SARS-CoV-2 in the past, and may still be storing samples of these viruses today.