A World Health Organization (W.H.O.) advisory group published a report on Thursday urging the U.N. agency and international public health experts to further investigate if the Chinese coronavirus pandemic originated with an accident at a research laboratory, reviving a widely derided theory that the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) could have contributed to the pandemic.
The report, drafted by the Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens (SAGO) of the W.H.O., does not specifically name the WIV, located in the city where the virus originated in late 2019, leading the Chinese Foreign Ministry to demand on Friday that the W.H.O. investigate laboratories in the United States as the origin of the Chinese coronavirus.
The call to further investigate the potential of a laboratory playing a role in the pandemic departs significantly from the conclusions of the first W.H.O. report on the origins of the virus published on March 2021, which dismissed the possibility as “highly unlikely” and concluded, with minimal evidence, that the virus first infected humans through an intermediary animal species that became infected from its original host.
The Chinese coronavirus originated in Wuhan, central China, in late 2019. No cases of Chinese coronavirus have been documented outside of Wuhan prior to the first cases confirmed there. Despite this, the Chinese Communist Party has repeatedly advanced the unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that the virus originated at a U.S. Army facility in Maryland.
The full SAGO report lamented that cooperation with Chinese scientists had not clarified the origins of the virus any further since the initial report on findings in Wuhan was published in March 2021. The report dedicates a segment exclusively to the potential of a viral leak from a laboratory and recommends “assessing the possibility of the introduction of SARS-CoV-2 [Chinese coronavirus] to the human population through a breach in biosafety and biosecurity measures through a laboratory incident.”
“During the discussions of the SAGO, the SAGO has agreed … that it remains important to consider all reasonable scientific data that is available either through published or other official sources to evaluate the possibility of the introduction of SARS-CoV-2 into the human population through a laboratory incident,” the report reads.
“During this pandemic and in past epidemics, there has been considerable discussion about the possibility of novel pathogens escaping into the human population due to a breach in biosafety or biosecurity in a laboratory or during field activities,” the report continued. “Recognizing that historically this has unfortunately happened with other pathogens, it is important to include studies in the global framework that address these risks.”
“There is also the continued need for the identification and regulation of high-risk pathogen manipulation studies including ‘gain of function’ and ‘dual use research of concern,'” the report added.
In its recommendation section, the SAGO report suggested that investigators need “to be access to and review of the evidence of all laboratory activities (both in vitro and in vivo studies) with coronaviruses including SARS-CoV-2-related viruses or close ancestors and the laboratory’s approach to implementation and improvement of laboratory biosafety and biosecurity.”
While not naming any individual laboratory, the recommendations suggest beginning with “those in the proximity of the original COVID-19 [Chinese coronavirus] outbreak working with SARS-like viruses in Wuhan, China and potentially with (2) those located worldwide where early COVID-19 cases have been retrospectively detected before 2020.”
“The SAGO notes that there has not been any new data made available to evaluate the laboratory as a pathway of SARS-CoV-2 into the human population and recommends further investigations into this and all other possible pathways,” the report added.
Elsewhere, the investigators noted investigators have yet to identify the animal that the virus originated from in the event that the dominant theory – that the virus spread from its initial host animal to a third party animal and then to humans – is correct. Scientists have, however, narrowed down several bat species as potential hosts. After testing 80,000 animal samples in China for the 2021 W.H.O. report and adding another nearly 40,000 samples for this week’s, the scientists still have not documented a single positive coronavirus test in a suspect animal.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry reacted to Thursday’s report by immediately demanding the W.H.O. investigate laboratories in the United States.
“Since the SAGO report has called for investigation into biological laboratories ‘located worldwide where early COVID-19 cases have been retrospectively detected’ for the next phase of study, investigation should first target highly suspicious laboratories such as those at Fort Detrick and the University of North Carolina in the US,” Foreign Ministry spokesman Zhao Lijian told reporters during a regular briefing on Friday.
Zhao was the first Chinese official to begin accusing the Fort Detrick, Maryland, Army facility of somehow being connected to the origins of Chinese coronavirus. The official Chinese government theory is that American officials falsely diagnosed early Chinese coronavirus cases as lung injuries caused by e-cigarettes, or vapes. The Chinese Communist Party has never explained why there has never been a documented case of a lung injury being contagious and infecting unprotected health workers if this was the case.
Failing to convince public health officials around the world that Maryland was the true home of the Chinese coronavirus, Zhao began accusing the University of North Carolina of starting the pandemic last year.
The W.H.O. report published this week suggesting further investigations into the potential role of laboratories near Wuhan, including the WIV, in the pandemic followed public discord between the agency and the Chinese government. W.H.O. Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus, who received Chinese support to become the first non-medical doctor in the role, recently criticized Beijing for continuing to impose repressive lockdowns on entire cities, allegedly to stop the spread of the virus. Chinese propaganda outlets condemned Tedros as “irresponsible” for the statements.
“When we talk about the zero COVID strategy, we don’t think that it is sustainable considering the behavior of the virus now and what we anticipate in the future, and especially when we have now a good knowledge, understanding of the virus,” Tedros said of China’s lockdowns in May.
“World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus’ remarks that China’s zero-COVID strategy is ‘unsustainable’ was seen by Chinese experts as ‘irresponsible’ comment [sic] on the Chinese people’s efforts in fighting the pandemic,” the Global Times Chinese government propaganda outlet declared.
Tedros had also criticized his own agency’s report from Wuhan in March 2021, claiming more investigations into the potential of a laboratory accident triggering the pandemic were necessary.
“The team also visited several laboratories in Wuhan and considered the possibility that the virus entered the human population as a result of a laboratory incident,” Tedros said at the time. “However, I do not believe that this assessment was extensive enough. Further data and studies will be needed to reach more robust conclusions. Although the team has concluded that a laboratory leak is the least likely hypothesis, this requires further investigation, potentially with additional missions involving specialist experts, which I am ready to deploy.”