Virus accidentally released from lab ?

[iam4liberty]

Nothing to see here.  Just move on.

https://news.yahoo.com/china-implements-restrictions-academic-research-134122682.html
China Implements New Restrictions on Academic Research into Coronavirus Origins

China has imposed new restrictions on academic research into the origins of COVID-19, CNN reported on Monday.

The new set of guidelines directs that “academic papers about tracing the origin of the virus must be strictly and tightly managed.” Papers must be submitted to a task force appointed by the State Council, the country’s administrative authority, in order to obtain approval for publication in academic journals.

The guidelines were first published on the website of Fudan University in Shanghai on Friday, and subsequently on the website of the China University of Geoscience in Wuhan, where the coronavirus originated. Both notices were subsequently taken down, although a cached version of the University of Geoscience’s notice remains accessible. A staff member for China’s Education Ministry confirmed that the ministry’s science and technology department had issued the order.

“It is not supposed to be made public — it is an internal document,” the staff member told CNN. Chinese researchers also told the network that the new guidelines had been put in place

[iam4liberty]

Conditions and safety protocols were so bad at lab that emergency letters were sent by embassy staff two years ago warning that a breach was imminent.  These need to be shut down ASAP.

https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2020/04/14/state-department-cables-warned-safety-issues-wuhan-lab-studying-bat-coronaviruses/
State Department cables warned of safety issues at Wuhan lab studying bat coronaviruses

Two years before the novel coronavirus pandemic upended the world, U.S. Embassy officials visited a Chinese research facility in the city of Wuhan several times and sent two official warnings back to Washington about inadequate safety at the lab, which was conducting risky studies on coronaviruses from bats. The cables have fueled discussions inside the U.S. government about whether this or another Wuhan lab was the source of the virus

[iam4liberty]

I am sure UK, Australia, and several other countries will join on.  Not one penny should be given to WHO until it does its regulatory job and demands China release the lab documents.  This coverup must end.

https://amp.cnn.com/cnn/2020/04/14/politics/donald-trump-world-health-organization-funding-coronavirus/index.html
Trump halts World Health Organization funding over handling of coronavirus outbreak

President Donald Trump announced Tuesday he is halting funding to the World Health Organization while a review is conducted.

Trump said the review would cover the WHO's "role in severely mismanaging and covering up the spread of coronavirus."

[iam4liberty]

https://news.yahoo.com/amphtml/intelligence-officials-weigh-possibility-coronavirus-escaped-from-a-chinese-lab-194958353.html
Intelligence officials weigh possibility coronavirus escaped from a Chinese lab

Although the the U.S. intelligence community early on dismissed the notion that the coronavirus is a synthesized bioweapon, it is still weighing the possibility that the pandemic might have been touched off by an accident at a research facility rather than by an infection from a live-animal market, according to nine current and former intelligence and national security officials familiar with ongoing investigations.

After extensive research, scientists in the U.S. and elsewhere have determined that the new strain of the coronavirus discovered in China in December is, as Chinese officials have maintained, of natural origin, but they are taking seriously that its route to human infection may have started in a lab in Wuhan.

“It’s definitely a real possibility being bandied about at the high levels of the administration,” said one of the sources, who has knowledge of China and national security.
...
scientists have not traced the initial exposure back to any specific animals. Therefore, an alternative possibility remains — that a natural virus sample being studied at a research laboratory in Wuhan infected a researcher who spread it in the community, or it escaped via hazardous waste or a lab animal. 
...
While the intelligence community is not discounting a range of potential transmission vectors, including contact between humans and animals, officials are seriously pursuing the possibility that a natural sample of the virus escaped a laboratory.

“It’s absolutely being looked at very closely at the highest levels,” said one intelligence source with knowledge of the investigations. The British government is reportedly considering the same possibility.

One reason for the suspicion is the lack of information coming from China. Beijing’s quick denials of involvement, and the decision to immediately identify the Wuhan Seafood Market as the source, raised eyebrows among some U.S. intelligence officials.

“I find it very funny that China very quickly blamed the market,” said one recently retired intelligence official.

The Chinese government did not respond to multiple requests for comment made through its foreign ministry and its embassy in the U.S.

In fact, some of the very first cases of COVID-19 were not linked to the market, and there are a number of important research institutions in Wuhan where infectious diseases are studied.

[iam4liberty]

https://youtube.com/watch?v=0SVJ9UHK6wU
Why did we give millions to risky Wuhan lab? Rep. Gaetz demands US stop funding Chinese research labs

[Morning Sunshine]

https://youtube.com/watch?v=0SVJ9UHK6wU
Why did we give millions to risky Wuhan lab? Rep. Gaetz demands US stop funding Chinese research labs

we give a lot of money to anyone and everyone who wants it.  I was honestly NOT surprised by this.  anyone with an agenda slips a few hundred thousand to a congress clown, and the congress clown slips 25 million into a bill to fund a pet project; usually a bill totally unrelated to the project in question.

[iam4liberty]

https://www.newsweek.com/international-policy-experts-blast-chinas-coronavirus-coverup-call-it-their-chernobyl-moment-1497839
INTERNATIONAL POLICY EXPERTS BLAST CHINA'S CORONAVIRUS COVERUP, CALL IT THEIR 'CHERNOBYL MOMENT'

A group of international policy experts and politicians strongly criticized China's government in an open letter about its coverup and mishandling of the coronavirus pandemic, referring to the botched response as a "Chernobyl moment."

The letter was published Tuesday on the website of Canada's Macdonald-Laurier Institute, a national public policy think tank based in Ottawa. It was signed by more than 100 policy experts, lawmakers and academics who hail largely from North America, Europe and Oceania.

"While the exact source and spread of the virus are not clear yet the question of origin is highly important, for the people of China and for all humankind: only by understanding how this global disaster could emerge we can prevent it from happening again," the letter argued.

It went on to say that the origins of the global pandemic "are in a cover-up by CCP [Chinese Communist Party] authorities in Wuhan, Hubei province."

[iam4liberty]

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/an-unnerving-review-of-accidents-in-high-level-labs-handling-viruses/amp/
An Unnerving Review of Accidents in High-Level Labs Handling Viruses

Two facilities in the city of Wuhan were researching coronaviruses in bats — the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and the Wuhan Center for Disease Control and Prevention.

The Wuhan Institute of Virology is China’s first biocontainment level-4 facility, inaugurated in 2015. It is still the country’s only one.

Professor Richard Ebright of Rutgers University’s Waksman Institute of Microbiology, told the Bulletin of Atomic Scientists last month that “bat coronaviruses at Wuhan [Center for Disease Control] and Wuhan Institute of Virology routinely were collected and studied at BSL-2, which provides only minimal protections against infection of lab workers.”
...
Lynn Klotz, a senior science fellow at the Center for Arms Control and Non-Proliferation, laid out a report suggesting that human errors at these sorts of labs not only had occurred, but occurred unnervingly frequently.

Incidents causing potential exposures to pathogens occur frequently in the high security laboratories often known by their acronyms, BSL3 (Biosafety Level 3) and BSL4. Lab incidents that lead to undetected or unreported laboratory-acquired infections can lead to the release of a disease into the community outside the lab; lab workers with such infections will leave work carrying the pathogen with them. If the agent involved were a potential pandemic pathogen, such a community release could lead to a worldwide pandemic with many fatalities.

Such releases are fairly likely over time, as there are at least 14 labs (mostly in Asia) now carrying out this research. Whatever release probability the world is gambling with, it is clearly far too high a risk to human lives. Mammal-transmissible bird flu research poses a real danger of a worldwide pandemic that could kill human beings on a vast scale.

Human error is the main cause of potential exposures of lab workers to pathogens. Statistical data from two sources show that human error was the cause of, according to my research, 67 percent and 79.3 percent of incidents leading to potential exposures in BSL3 labs. These percentages come from analysis of years of incident data from the Federal Select Agent Program (FSAP) and from the National Institutes of Health (NIH).

Klotz described needle sticks and other through the skin exposures from sharp objects; dropped containers or spills and splashes of liquids containing pathogens; bites or scratches from infected animals; pathogens manipulated outside of a biosafety cabinet or other equipment designed to protect exposures to infectious aerosols; failure to follow safety procedures; failure or problems with personal protective equipment; mechanical or equipment failure; and failure to properly inactivate pathogens before transferring them to a lower biosafety level lab for further research. There are plenty of real-life examples for every medical menace in every Robin Cook novel. And this is separate from the other frightening examples of lab accidents laid out last week.

[iam4liberty]

We should have Australia lead the independent investigation.  They have really been on top of things and would be a good liaison given their strong ties to both the East and West.

https://youtu.be/qNk1ldRb7dY
China must explain 'coronavirus catastrophe'

[iam4liberty]

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/coronavirus-wuhan-lab-china-compete-us-sources.amp
Sources believe coronavirus originated in Wuhan lab as part of China's efforts to compete with US

There is increasing confidence that COVID-19 likely originated in a Wuhan laboratory not as a bioweapon, but as part of China's effort to demonstrate that its efforts to identify and combat viruses are equal to or greater than the capabilities of the United States, multiple sources who have been briefed on the details of early actions by China's government and seen relevant materials tell Fox News.

This may be the "costliest government coverup of all time," one of the sources said.

The sources believe the initial transmission of the virus was bat-to-human, and that "patient zero" worked at the laboratory, then went into the population in Wuhan.

The “increasing confidence” comes from classified and open-source documents and evidence, the sources said. Fox  News has requested to see the evidence directly.

Asked by Fox News' John Roberts about the reporting, President Trump remarked at Wednesday's coronavirus press briefing, "More and more we're hearing the story...we are doing a very thorough examination of this horrible situation."

Documents detail early efforts by doctors at the lab and early efforts at containment. The Wuhan wet market initially identified as a possible point of origin never sold bats, and the sources tell Fox News that blaming the wet market was an effort by China to deflect blame from the laboratory, along with the country's propaganda efforts targeting the U.S. and Italy.

U.S. Embassy officials warned in January 2018 about inadequate safety at the Wuhan Institute of Virology lab and passed on information about scientists conducting risky research on coronavirus from bats, The Washington Post reported Tuesday.

[LvsChant]

Does this mean we aren't in the tinfoil hat brigade anymore???

[Mr. Bill]

Does this mean we aren't in the tinfoil hat brigade anymore???

Not quite yet.  It just means that unnamed "multiple sources who have been briefed on the details of early actions by China's government and seen relevant materials" have said something.

But I think this description of events is plausible.

The sources believe the initial transmission of the virus was bat-to-human, and that "patient zero" worked at the laboratory, then went into the population in Wuhan.

This sentence has been updated in the story.  It now reads:

The sources believe the initial transmission of the virus – a naturally occurring strain that was being studied there – was bat-to-human and that "patient zero" worked at the laboratory, then went into the population in Wuhan.

So we're still in the same place, sorta.  These sources say the strain was naturally-occuring, and research has shown that it could have arisen naturally.  So the remaining question is, did it pass from animals to humans outside the lab, or via a lab employee (or both)?

[iam4liberty]

No conspiracy here. The communist party has been completely above board on all of this.

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/17/world/asia/china-wuhan-coronavirus-death-toll.html
China Raises Coronavirus Death Toll by 50% in Wuhan
Officials facing skepticism about their credibility also bumped up their tally of infections in the city where the pandemic emerged.

China on Friday raised its coronavirus death toll by 50 percent in Wuhan, the city where the outbreak first emerged, amid accusations that the government had concealed the extent of the epidemic.

Officials placed the new tally at 3,869 deaths from the coronavirus in the central Chinese city, an increase of 1,290 from the previous figure. The number of cumulative confirmed infections in the city was also revised upward to 50,333, an increase of 325.

The move appeared to be a response to growing questions about the accuracy of China’s official numbers and calls to hold the country responsible for a global health crisis that has killed more than 142,000 people and caused a worldwide economic slowdown.

China has been criticized as having initially mismanaged and concealed the extent of the epidemic

[iam4liberty]

Not quite yet.  It just means that unnamed "multiple sources who have been briefed on the details of early actions by China's government and seen relevant materials" have said something.

But now it is able to be discussed on youtube and facebook without repurcussions. So the greater populous can see informed discussion not just the chinese communist propaganda.

https://youtu.be/IpPgqPLFEXY

[Mr. Bill]

Here's something I'd really like to know.  Recall we've got other unnamed sources who claim that US intelligence knew about a viral outbreak in the Wuhan area by late November.  Suppose this is true.  What does it say about the path (or multiple paths) of infection spread?  Who was sick in mid-to-late November, and where were they?  In the city?  In rural areas?  Because maybe "patient zero" was in some small village in early November, and that's why Chinese researchers at the lab were scrambling to research the virus by December.

The lab is still a plausible source for the spread to the city, but maybe they were just one focal point for a virus that was already spreading on its own.

Of course, China will never tell us about any of this.

[mountainmoma]

Here's something I'd really like to know.  Recall we've got other unnamed sources who claim that US intelligence knew about a viral outbreak in the Wuhan area by late November.  Suppose this is true.  What does it say about the path (or multiple paths) of infection spread?  Who was sick in mid-to-late November, and where were they?  In the city?  In rural areas?  Because maybe "patient zero" was in some small village in early November, and that's why Chinese researchers at the lab were scrambling to research the virus by December.

The lab is still a plausible source for the spread to the city, but maybe they were just one focal point for a virus that was already spreading on its own.

Of course, China will never tell us about any of this.

Governor  Newsom, California, had our health departments go thru the data and in California there is no difference in cases or cases mortality based on race.  The racial composition is in line with the population of California.

That is a fact, now we can speculate, the first step to developing theories.

What might be a difference then in Detroit or Chicago or other big cities ?  We are back to lifestyle, diet, obesity, etc... and also potentially Vit D deficiency since we have less of that in CA and it is harder to get enough naturally if dark skinned in Northern areas of the USA.  While that is true, I have not seen any link with COVID-19, but just putting that out there as one difference due to the geography/race overlap.  Another geographical difference could be pollutants.  Not saying CA doesnt have any, but they are likely different.  Our hardest hit area, L.A. county has our worst air pollution.  SOme of the inland counties have it bad in summer, so we will see.

Also our larger population areas are overall warmer than the large cities in other areas, and in that, not about virus spread but that the people and their homes are not fighting off the cold.  It is hard to get better if you are cold and it can be a drain on the immune system, that and lack of sunlight.  Wuhan China does not have heat supplied to its apartment blocks,  even their quarantine field hospitals they set up, you could see the healthcare workers in down coats.  Not saying richer people there may not have heat, but it is not the norm. 

[LvsChant]

From some of the reports I saw, the type of bat that is a natural carrier for this type of virus resides in caves hundreds of miles from Wuhan. I watched a documentary showing a researcher on a bat-gathering trip (prior to the outbreak). They gathered the bats and took them for research to the Wuhan lab, iirc.

[iam4liberty]

Here's something I'd really like to know.  Recall we've got other unnamed sources who claim that US intelligence knew about a viral outbreak in the Wuhan area by late November.  Suppose this is true.  What does it say about the path (or multiple paths) of infection spread?  Who was sick in mid-to-late November, and where were they?  In the city?  In rural areas?  Because maybe "patient zero" was in some small village in early November, and that's why Chinese researchers at the lab were scrambling to research the virus by December.

The lab is still a plausible source for the spread to the city, but maybe they were just one focal point for a virus that was already spreading on its own.

Of course, China will never tell us about any of this.

Here is a summary of the general timeline as is now being laid out:

Two lab workers became infected in November at the lab. They passed it on to at least 12 other people including the one's girlfriend who became a superspreader.  By Decmber 8 Wuhan's Jinyintan Hospital had seven pnuemonia patients of unknown origin including the girlfriend whose viral count was off the chart. These were quaranteened and samples taken to an independent medical lab for identification of virus.  They reported it was an unknown (to them, it was known by the research lab) SARs-like coronavirus and the doctor in charge tried to warn the public but was rebuked. The next week an elderly husband and wife who owned a popular establishment at the Wuhan Seafood Market was brought in.  They apparently spread it to dozens more.  On January, 23 they had about 100 such cases at the hospital including a half dozen of the hospital staff one of which was the whistleblowing doctor who later died.  At that time the military descended around the city and it was completely locked down (except for travel to foreign countries by air!)

US intelligence agencies had been closely monitoring the biolab since 2015 because of concerns of safety.  In 2016 and 2017 they noted several major breaches.  In January 2018 teams of US scientists were brought in by embassy to assess situation.  They confirmed the lab was a ticking bomb and were especially alarmed by the dangerous bat coronaviruses which were being treated in a blase manner. They sent memos back to Washington asking for help addressing with the Chinese government. In late November 2019 the intelligence agents saw frantic activity at the lab suggesting a major breach had occured, this included a lab lockdown and testing of staff.  Mlitary personnel descended and the lab was taken over by them.  They also observed starting in December bodies being quietly removed from the Jinyintan hospital and quickly cremated. Wuhan social media was abuzz.  This information started making its way into briefing reports.  But China was on full propaganda mode including using WHO to pass on false information.  On January 14 WHO issued statements saying the coronavirus could not be transmitted person to person.  They also used their influence with the Bllomberg network and CNN to push this which started the fake seafood market narrative.  Based on confirmation of first US cases in last week of January, Trump ordered flights cut off from China.  Again the US media was used as a pawn by China.  So while China had completely locked down internal travel from Wuhan, they were allowing people there to spread it to other parts of the world.

[surfivor]

 Man who discovered AIDS adds his opinion

https://asiatimes.com/2020/04/french-prof-sparks-furor-with-lab-leak-theory/

A theory put forward by French professor Luc Montagnier — award-winning co-discoverer of the AIDS virus but also mocked by some colleagues for some outrageous theories — has sparked a scientific firestorm.

According to the Nobel Prize winner in Medicine, a man used to controversy, the SARS-CoV-2 virus is the result of an attempt to manufacture a vaccine against the AIDS virus, Agence France Presse reported.

Montagnier says the presence of elements of HIV in the genome of the new virus and even elements of the “germ of malaria” are highly suspect, the report said. Interviewed on the French CNews channel, he said the characteristics of the new coronavirus could not have arisen naturally.

[Hurricane]

So while China had completely locked down internal travel from Wuhan, they were allowing people there to spread it to other parts of the world.

Allowing?
Encouraging? Not letting a crisis go to waste?

I can believe the original incident may have been an honest lab mishap, but perhaps it was taken advantage of?

[iam4liberty]

Nothing to see here.  Just move on.

https://news.yahoo.com/china-implements-restrictions-academic-research-134122682.html
China Implements New Restrictions on Academic Research into Coronavirus Origins

https://www.sciencetimes.com/amp/articles/25285/20200413/china-study-claiming-coronavirus-came-wuhan-labs-allegedly-removed-internet.htm
China Study Claiming Coronavirus Came From Wuhan Labs Allegedly Removed From the Internet

a recent Chinese research paper that was showing how the coronavirus originated from a Wuhan biolab and not from bats being sold at the market had just been censored by communist authorities from online publication.
...
The missing paper was said to be written by Botao Xiao as well as Lei Xiao from South China University of Technology. The paper was titled "The Possible Origins of the 2019-n-CoV coronavirus" and confirmed that the virus did not, in fact, come from horseshoe bats that were being sold in the Wuhan market.
...
the authors of "The Possible Origins" paper were able to trace the virus to two different Wuhan institutes. The researchers said that "Within 280 meters from the market, there was the Wuhan Center for Disease Control and Prevention (WHCDC). WHCDC hosted animals in laboratories for research purposes, one of which was specialized in pathogens collection and identification."

The Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) located seven miles away was also reported to have been conducting research on the same bats.

[iam4liberty]

https://nypost.com/2020/04/23/china-blocking-us-scientists-from-examining-coronavirus-pompeo/amp/
China continues to block US scientists from examining coronavirus

“Even today, the Chinese government hasn’t permitted American scientists to go into China, to go into not only the Wuhan lab or wherever it needs to go to learn about this virus, to learn about its origins,”
...
“Look, we know it began at one [lab], but we need to figure this out. There’s an ongoing pandemic. We still don’t have the transparency and openness we need in China.”

Pompeo also maintained his criticism of the World Health Organization for its failure to ensure the Chinese Communist Party reported accurate numbers so that the world could have taken the necessary precautions when the pandemic was in its early stages.

“It is the World Health Organization’s responsibility to achieve that transparency. They’re not doing it. They need to be held accountable,” he said. “And what’s been great is to see other countries around the world to begin to recognize the WHO failures as well.”

[iam4liberty]

We should have Australia lead the independent investigation.  They have really been on top of things and would be a good liaison given their strong ties to both the East and West.

Australia has anounced it will lead calls for an independent investigation, asking to have lab inspections in China the same way as is done by weapons of mass destruction inspectors.  China immediately denounced any independent investigation of lab and there are reports they have been destroying all lab records and specimins. Recently they have taken down all images from the lab, many which show severe safety issues.  WHO cant afford (literally) to deny the calls, no matter what its communist leader says. 

https://www.straitstimes.com/asia/australianz/australia-says-all-who-members-should-participate-in-a-coronavirus-inquiry
Australia to pursue coronavirus investigation at World Health Assembly

Australia will push for an international investigation into the coronavirus pandemic at next month’s annual meeting of the World Health Assembly, the decision-making body of the World Health Organisation (WHO), its prime minister said on Thursday (April 23).

Australia wants the WHO to be strengthened and is suggesting introducing inspectors with the power to enter a country to respond more quickly to a health crisis in the style of weapons inspectors.

Australia sits on the executive board of the assembly, which determines WHO policies and appoints the director-general. The assembly is due to meet on May 17.
...
China has criticised Australia’s call for an investigation as “political manipulation”
...
"The so-called independent inquiry proposed by Australia is in reality political manipulation," said China’s foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang, speaking at a daily news briefing in Beijing on Thursday. "We advise Australia to give up its ideological prejudices," he said.

[iam4liberty]

After hack of Wuhan lab's emails, mainstream publications like newsweek are now releasing articles on gain of function research that occured at the lab.  Before they claimed this research didnt happen and was just 'conspiracy theory'.  Now they appear to be preparing public for recognition of the numerous independent studies from around the world that showed COVID-19 is a naturally occuring bat virus modified by "overzealous" scientists to increase its ability to infect humans.

https://www.newsweek.com/controversial-wuhan-lab-experiments-that-may-have-started-coronavirus-pandemic-1500503
THE CONTROVERSIAL WUHAN LAB EXPERIMENTS THAT MAY HAVE STARTED THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC


The coronavirus pandemic may be a result of controversial experiments inside the Wuhan Institute of Virology, as U.S. intelligence now concedes. Chinese virologist Shi Zhengli inside the P4 laboratory in Wuhan, China, on February 23, 2017. - . (Photo by Johannes EISELE / AFP) (Photo by JOHANNES EISELE/AFP via Getty Images)


Just one day after the U.S. surpassed China to become the country with the highest number of Covid-19 cases, the U.S. Defense Intelligence Agency updated its assessment of the origin of the novel coronavirus to reflect that it may have been accidentally released from an infectious diseases lab, Newsweek has learned.

The report, dated March 27 and corroborated by two U.S. officials, reveals that U.S. intelligence revised its January assessment in which it "judged that the outbreak probably occurred naturally" to now include the possibility that the new coronavirus emerged "accidentally" due to "unsafe laboratory practices" in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the pathogen was first observed late last year.
...
in early February, China's Academy for Military Medical Sciences "concluded that it was impossible for them to scientifically determine whether the Covid-19 outbreak was caused naturally or accidentally from a laboratory incident," according to the DIA document.
...
U.S. government and Chinese researchers that found "about 33 percent of the original 41 identified cases did not have direct exposure" to the market. That, along with what's known of the laboratory's work in past few years, raised reasonable suspicion that the pandemic may have been caused by a lab error, not the wet market.
...
The Wuhan Institute has a record of shoddy practices that could conceivably lead to an accidental release, as officials at the U.S. Embassy in Beijing reportedly warned in a cable on January 19, 2018. "During interactions with scientists at the WIV laboratory, they noted the new lab has a serious shortage of appropriately trained technicians and investigators needed to safely operate this high-containment laboratory," states the cable, according to the Washington Post.
...
The circumstantial evidence is strong enough to warrant putting the lab's programs and practices at heart of the investigation. And it's worth looking anew at whether scientists, in their efforts to protect the public from the threat of natural pathogens, overreached.
...
By the time the current pandemic hit, animal-passage experiments had become commonplace. Scientists in many of the more than 30 BSL-4 labs around the world had used them to enhance the transmissibility of respiratory-tract pathogens.
...
China's role

The Wuhan Institute of Virology is one of many labs to receive PREDICT funding. Shi Zheng-Li, a virologist known as "bat woman" for her group's work in collecting hundreds of coronaviruses, and her staff at the Institute explored the same bat caves that were thought to have given rise to the original SARS virus in 2002. Her scientists penetrated remote caves, swabbing bats' anuses and collecting their excretions. When they returned to the lab, they cultured the viruses they found, determined their genomic sequences and tried to determine how they infect cells and animals in the lab.

The Institute began a program of gain-of-function research into bat coronaviruses in 2015. That involved taking selected strains and seeking to increase the ability of those viruses to transmit from one person to another. The gain-of-function research went hand-in-hand with the surveillance project. As scientists identified new classes of bat viruses that have the ability to infect human cells, that raised the question of what changes would have to arise in nature to make that virus transmissible in humans, which would pose a pandemic threat.

[Mr. Bill]

https://www.newsweek.com/controversial-wuhan-lab-experiments-that-may-have-started-coronavirus-pandemic-1500503
THE CONTROVERSIAL WUHAN LAB EXPERIMENTS THAT MAY HAVE STARTED THE CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC

That's a well-written article.

I think they present the big question clearly: If the virus passed from bats to humans via one or more other animals, how could you tell the difference between animal passage in nature vs animal passage in the Wuhan lab?

... Jonathan Eisen, an evolutionary biologist at UC Davis, says that the preponderance of evidence, while not definitive, suggests that the virus came from nature, not a lab. "There's no hint there that there's something unnatural, that is, genetically engineered," he says. But "there is some wiggle room" in the findings that admits the possibility that the virus was concocted in a lab via animal passage. "Passaging is hard to test for. Escape from a lab is hard to test for," he says. "If [Wuhan researchers] collected something from the field and they were doing some experiments in the lab with it, and some person got infected and then it spread from there, that would be really hard to distinguish from it having spread in the field directly." ...

It's all circumstantial evidence until China releases the relevant data (i.e., 1000 years from now).

[iam4liberty]

Circumstantial evidence is all that is needed for conviction.  But it is probably a mistake to assume that direct evidence isnt already in hand.  The Chinese werent the only ones monitoring the experiments in the lab, the French were involved.  There are also spparently many witnesses to the lab being locked down by military and Shi Zhengli being recalled from an industry conference in a panic. And reports of the email hack appear legit. 

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/coronavirus-china-bars-safety-experts-from-wuhan-lab-brbm9rwtm
Coronavirus: China bars safety experts from Wuhan lab

China prevented French experts from overseeing safety at its first high-security virus laboratory, which is now facing claims that it was the origin of the coronavirus pandemic, according to French officials.

The laboratory in the city of Wuhan, where the Covid-19 outbreak began last year, was the first in China to have a biosafety level 4 (BSL 4) rating, which is reserved for institutions working with potentially fatal agents. It was conducting research into coronaviruses, some derived from bats, from which the pathogen is thought to have originated.

The facility opened in 2015 after being built in partnership with France, which was meant to supply the technical expertise with 50 high-level French researchers due to work there between 2017 and 2022.

[iam4liberty]

https://www.wsj.com/amp/articles/coronavirus-and-the-laboratories-in-wuhan-11587486996
Coronavirus and the Laboratories in Wuhan
Their researchers travel to caves across China, where they capture live bats to study viruses.

The U.S. government is investigating whether the Covid-19 virus came from a government laboratory in Wuhan, China. The Chinese Communist Party denies the possibility. “There is no way this virus came from us,” claimed Yuan Zhiming over the weekend. Mr. Yuan is a top researcher at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which studies some of the world’s deadliest pathogens. He is also secretary of the lab’s Communist Party committee. He accuses me of “deliberately trying to mislead people” for suggesting his laboratory as a possible origin for the pandemic.
...
While the Chinese government denies the possibility of a lab leak, its actions tell a different story. The Chinese military posted its top epidemiologist to the Institute of Virology in January. In February Chairman Xi Jinping urged swift implementation of new biosafety rules to govern pathogens in laboratory settings. Academic papers about the virus’s origins are now subject to prior restraint by the government.

In early January, enforcers threatened doctors who warned their colleagues about the virus. Among them was Li Wenliang, who died of Covid-19 in February. Laboratories working to sequence the virus’s genetic code were ordered to destroy their samples. The laboratory that first published the virus’s genome was shut down, Hong Kong’s South China Morning Post reported in February.

This evidence is circumstantial, to be sure, but it all points toward the Wuhan labs. Thanks to the Chinese coverup, we may never have direct, conclusive evidence—intelligence rarely works that way—but Americans justifiably can use common sense to follow the inherent logic of events to their likely conclusion.

[iam4liberty]

So here is a huge issue.  Some bio-researchers are silently outsourcing research to shoddy offshore labs to skirt regulations and avoid costs associated with propper precautions. So, the US taxpayer ends up funding this craziness.  Imagine physicists outsourcing government nuclear development to Iran or North Korea.  That would be utterly insane.  But in the biosciences they are routinely doing this with things which are much more dangerous. 

https://nypost.com/2020/04/28/nih-investigating-wuhan-lab-at-center-of-coronavirus-pandemic/amp/
NIH investigating Wuhan lab at center of coronavirus pandemic

The National Institutes of Health revealed it is investigating the Chinese lab where the coronavirus outbreak is speculated to have emerged, in a letter to a research facility that supplied US tax dollars to the lab, according to a report.
...
“It is our understanding that one of the sub-recipients of the grant funds is the Wuhan Institute of Virology (‘WIV’). It is our understanding that WIV studies the interaction between corona viruses and bats. The scientific community believes that the coronavirus causing COVID-19 jumped from bats to humans likely in Wuhan where the COVID-19 pandemic began,”
...
“There are now allegations that the current crisis was precipitated by the release from WIV of the coronavirus responsible for COVID-19. Given these concerns, we are pursuing suspension of WIV from participation in Federal programs,” it continued.
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“It is in the public interest that NIH ensure that a sub-recipient has taken all appropriate precautions to prevent the release of pathogens that it is studying,”

[iam4liberty]

Oh what a tangle web we weave...  So Fauci has known all along that they were doing gain-of-function work, which many independent scientists have said there are clear indications of within COVID-19 (see numerous posts above).

https://www.newsweek.com/dr-fauci-backed-controversial-wuhan-lab-millions-us-dollars-risky-coronavirus-research-1500741
DR. FAUCI BACKED CONTROVERSIAL WUHAN LAB WITH MILLIONS OF U.S. DOLLARS FOR RISKY CORONAVIRUS RESEARCH

just last year, the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, the organization led by Dr. Fauci, funded scientists at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and other institutions for work on gain-of-function research on bat coronaviruses.

In 2019, with the backing of NIAID, the National Institutes of Health committed $3.7 million over six years for research that included some gain-of-function work. The program followed another $3.7 million, 5-year project for collecting and studying bat coronaviruses, which ended in 2019, bringing the total to $7.4 million.

Many scientists have criticized gain of function research, which involves manipulating viruses in the lab to explore their potential for infecting humans, because it creates a risk of starting a pandemic from accidental release.

SARS-CoV-2 , the virus now causing a global pandemic, is believed to have originated in bats. U.S. intelligence, after originally asserting that the coronavirus had occurred naturally, conceded last month that the pandemic may have originated in a leak from the Wuhan lab.
...
Dr. Fauci did not respond to Newsweek's requests for comment.
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The NIH research consisted of two parts. The first part began in 2014 and involved surveillance of bat coronaviruses, and had a budget of $3.7 million. The program funded Shi Zheng-Li, a virologist at the Wuhan lab, and other researchers to investigate and catalogue bat coronaviruses in the wild. This part of the project was completed in 2019.

A second phase of the project, beginning that year, included additional surveillance work but also gain-of-function research for the purpose of understanding how bat coronaviruses could mutate to attack humans.
...
Three years later, though—in December 2017—the NIH ended the moratorium and the second phase of the NIAID project, which included the gain-of-function research, began. The NIH established a framework for determining how the research would go forward: scientists have to get approval from a panel of experts, who would decide whether the risks were justified.

The reviews were indeed conducted—but in secret, for which the NIH has drawn criticism. In early 2019, after a reporter for Science magazine discovered that the NIH had approved two influenza research projects that used gain of function methods, scientists who oppose this kind of research excoriated the NIH in an editorial in the Washington Post.

"We have serious doubts about whether these experiments should be conducted at all," wrote Tom Inglesby of Johns Hopkins University and Marc Lipsitch of Harvard. "[W]ith deliberations kept behind closed doors, none of us will have the opportunity to understand how the government arrived at these decisions or to judge the rigor and integrity of that process."

[iam4liberty]

China threatens Australia with economic attacks if it doesnt drop calls for investigation of Wuhan lab.

https://www.foxnews.com/world/china-lashes-out-us-australia-coronavirus.amp
China lashes out at US, threatens Australia

China's ambassador to Australia warned on Monday that the government's call for an independent international inquiry into the origins of the pandemic could lead to a Chinese boycott of Australian products.

"Maybe the ordinary people will say, 'Why should we drink Australian wine? Eat Australian beef?'" Ambassador Chen Jingye threatened, The Australian Financial Review reported.

Australian's foreign minister Marise Payne hit back, dismissing China's attempt at "economic coercion."

That didn't sit well with China, which prompted Hu Xijin, editor-in-chief of the Global Times, to tweet: "Let me give a 'coercion' to Australia. As its attitude toward China becomes worse and worse, Chinese companies will definitely reduce economic cooperation with Australia, and the number of Chinese students & visitors going to Australia will also decrease. Time will prove it all."