Wuhan Covid lab planning ‘ominous' new bat experiments
The Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) published new research this month announcing it had found a bat coronavirus that can enter human cells, similar to a Covid-19 infection.
The paper concludes with calls for 'further investigation' into strains that have more infectious spike proteins, as well as testing in human transgenic mice.
The first known Covid cases emerged just eight miles from WIV, which was known to be collecting and manipulating coronaviruses.
The institute was stripped of US funding for carrying out dangerous experiments ahead of the outbreak, and the US select subcommittee on the coronavirus pandemic concluded in December that the disease 'most likely' leaked from a Wuhan lab.
Experts warned that the latest experiments were being carried out below recommended biosafety levels, and that future proposals were alarmingly similar to those which could have sparked the pandemic.
Dr Alina Chan, a molecular biologist at the Broad Institute of MIT and Harvard, said: 'The paper ends on an ominous note – describing a set of future experiments similar to what might've led to the Covid-19 pandemic.
'They're going to test more of such viruses with different-looking spike proteins. They're going to study cleavage sites and how they activate the spike in these viruses.
'They're going to study the viruses' ability to cause disease in humanised mice.'
She added: 'After what we experienced with Covid-19, I believe there is no biosafety level adequate for such experiments in the city of Wuhan. If such work has to be done, it should be done at a biosafety level 4 far away from any city centre.'
Some scientists continue to assert that Covid-19 jumped from an animal, but despite five years of searching, a natural origin has never been discovered.
Before the pandemic, WIV had collected more than 220 Sars-related coronaviruses, at least 100 of which were never made public.
Members of staff were also photographed wearing inadequate levels of personal protective equipment while handling bats.
US intelligence also discovered that three researchers at WIV had sought treatment at a hospital after falling ill with Covid-like symptoms in Nov 2019.
The new virus that has been found is called HKU5-CoV-2, and it is a new member of the coronavirus family which can infect cells by targeting the human ACE2 receptor, similar to Covid-19.
It belongs to a different group of coronaviruses than Covid-19 called merbecoviruses, which include Mers (Middle East Respiratory Syndrome), and it cannot currently spread as well as Covid-19.
There are no known human cases, and no proof of human-to-human transmission.
But there are fears that WIV may carry out controversial experiments to increase the infectivity of the new virus, known as gain-of-function work.
It is also possible that infecting humanised mice may allow the virus to evolve naturally in the lab, and become more dangerous in a process known as passaging.
One of the paper's authors is Dr Shi Zheng-Li, who was dubbed 'batwoman' for her work collecting and manipulating bat viruses before the pandemic and who initially feared the virus had leaked from her lab.
Lord Ridley, author of Viral: The Search for the Origin of Covid-19, said: 'Many of us thought they would probably at least tiptoe away from this kind of research, even while not admitting that it probably caused the pandemic.
'But no, it seems they are intent on doing similar experiments again, in a city centre, with risky viruses. How does it keep people safe to test risky viruses to see if they like human receptors?'
Some scientists have claimed Covid-19 moved from a bat into an intermediate host before jumping to humans. The new paper suggests that bat coronaviruses can evolve to use human entry receptors for infection, sidestepping the need for an intermediate host.
Dr Gary McLean, honorary senior research fellow at Imperial College London, said: 'Hopefully the Chinese authorities now have good surveillance systems in place and the laboratories work to rigid safety standards that minimise the risk of spillover occurring.'
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