New documents bolster the theory that it not only escaped from a laboratory but was developed in one.

Opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal by Nicholas Wade

In the four years since the SARS-CoV-2 virus was unleashed on the world, data have steadily accumulated supporting the hypothesis that it emerged from a laboratory. The latest information, released last month, makes a formidable case that the virus is the product of laboratory synthesis, not of nature.

This startling fact will probably take some time to sink into the national consciousness, given the mainstream media’s sustained inability to report the issue objectively. Editors have failed to think beyond the extreme politicization that requires liberals to oppose the lab-leak hypothesis. Science journalists are too beholden to their sources to suspect that virologists would lie to them about the extent of their profession’s responsibility for a catastrophic pandemic.

Here are some salient facts that haven’t been clearly reported to readers of the mainstream press:

In March 2018 a team of American and Chinese virologists applied to the Pentagon’s Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency, known as Darpa, seeking a $14 million grant to manipulate viruses related to SARS-CoV-1, the bat virus that caused a minor epidemic in 2002. Their goal was to identify bat viruses in Asia with the highest potential for jumping to people and to immunize bats so they wouldn’t infect soldiers in the region.

The proposal for Project DEFUSE specified that the viruses’ infectivity would be enhanced by inserting into them a genetic element known as a furin cleavage site. Depending on the starting viruses, this protocol could have produced SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes Covid-19, which has a distinctive furin cleavage site.

In 2022 three biologists, Valentin Bruttel, Alex Washburne and Antonius VanDongen, guessed that if SARS-CoV 2 had been generated in a lab by a standard method, it would have been assembled from six sections of lab-synthesized DNA with the help of a biological agent called BsmBI. On analyzing the virus’s structure, they found evidence for the seams between sections and other distinctive marks of the assembly process.

Their paper was derided as “ kindergarten molecular biology” by the virologists who are favorites of the mainstream press for their opposition to the lab-leak hypothesis. But a batch of documents reveal new details about the DEFUSE proposal and confirm that the three authors were on target. Emily Kopp of U.S. Right to Know obtained the documents through a Freedom of Information Act request from the Interior Department, having noticed that a researcher at the U.S. Geological Survey was a member of the DEFUSE team.

The new documents, which are background planning papers and drafts for the DEFUSE proposal, call for assembling SARS-like viruses from six sections of DNA, and include a cost estimate for purchase of the BsmBI restriction enzyme— exactly as the three authors had inferred. This clearly strengthens, perhaps conclusively, their contention that the virus is synthetic. Richard H. Ebright, a molecular biologist at Rutgers University, says it raises “to the level of a smoking gun” the genetic evidence that the virus was manufactured.

Other strong indicators of the virus’s laboratory birth include the furin cleavage site, possessed by none of the other more than 1,500 members of its viral family with which in nature it might swap genetic material. The codons—“words” used by the genetic code to specify the units of proteins—that define the cleavage site are those preferred by humans, not coronaviruses, pointing to their likely origin in a lab kit. And whereas most viruses require repeated tries to switch from an animal host to people, SARS-CoV-2 infected humans out of the box, as if it had been preadapted while growing in the humanized mice called for in the DEFUSE protocol.

The authors of the proposal were a team led by Peter Daszak of the EcoHealth Alliance of New York, Shi Zhengli of the Wuhan Institute of Virology and Ralph Baric of the University of North Carolina. Although Mr. Baric is the leading expert on the technology, Mr. Daszak intended for much or most of the work to be done in Ms. Shi’s laboratory, despite giving a different impression to Darpa. He writes in the recently discovered documents that “I do want to stress the US side of this proposal so that DARPA are comfortable with our team. Once we get the funds, we can then allocate who does what exact work, and I believe that a lot of these assays can be done in Wuhan.”

Ms. Shi did most of her work with SARS-type viruses in the minimal-containment condition known as BSL2, whereas Mr. Baric, who regarded the viruses as seriously dangerous, worked in a more secure lab known as BSL3. Mr. Daszak noted that the lower-security labs would save money: “The BSL-2 nature of work on SARSr CoVs makes our system highly cost-effective relative to other bat-virus systems.” Mr. Baric replied to this comment that the viruses might be grown under BSL2 safety conditions in China, but “US researchers will likely freak out.” Mr. Daszak’s EcoHealth Alliance last year asserted that the DEFUSE project was never implemented: “The proposal was not funded and the work was never done, therefore it cannot have played a role in the origin of COVID-19.” But science is a competitive business. After Darpa turned down the DEFUSE proposal in February 2019, the researchers in Wuhan might have secured Chinese government funding and gone ahead by themselves. Viruses made according to the DEFUSE protocol could have been available by the time Covid-19 broke out, sometime between August and November 2019. This would account for the otherwise unexplained timing of the pandemic along with its place of origin. (Mr. Daszak, Mr. Baric and Ms. Shi didn’t respond to emails seeking comment. Chinese officials have demanded that the U.S. “stop defaming China” by raising the possibility of a lab leak.) One piece is missing from the puzzle— the identity of the parent viruses from which SARS-CoV-2 was derived. The Chinese authorities have rigorously suppressed all information about the viruses being kept in the Wuhan Institute of Virology. But the documentary and scientific evidence already assembled seems sufficient to understand the genesis of the pandemic that killed millions.

Mr. Wade is a former science editor of the New York Times.

LINK

quote:

In the four years since the SARS-CoV-2 virus was unleashed on the world, data have steadily accumulated supporting the hypothesis that it emerged from a laboratory.

Yes... and widely explored and discussed.
https://sigforum.com/eve/forum.../m/9320007564/p/1200

Originally posted by wcb6092:
He nailed it this time.





What newly uncovered evidence?
David Martin exposed the connections in his first Plandemic Video back in 2020.
All the stories where the US blaming China and China blaming the US is pure propaganda. The United States government has been in bed with China since the beginning.

I don’t know why I didn’t find that post when I searched, but for perspective when I searched for “COVID” in thread subjects alone, I got 120 hits, and therefore figured one more wouldn’t cause the forum to crash. The subject of the lab leak is also a somewhat limited topic in the broader issue of the disease that is discussed at great length in that main thread, and I have therefore ignored for a great length of time.

And there is knowing and knowing. Where what is "known" and reported makes a difference.

But thanks for that.

Both points have been obvious for a long time.

The real question is; was this just a well intentioned (but ill-advised) experiment to understand how these viruses can mutate so science can better understand to process and prevent future outbreaks, or an intentional act?

I suspect the former with some additional twists.
This type of extremely risky research was likely determined to be unacceptable here in the US and maybe other western countries. So what's a curious scientific community to do?
Subcontract it out to another jurisdiction where the ethical, and security/safety standards, are not so high.

Enter some faction at the NIH (likely under Fauci) that probably wrote some checks and also assisted in some form do move this research forward in a more understanding regulatory environment with much lower safety standards.

It wouldn't surprise me if both SARS (also confirmed from China) and MERS, (a bat virus type but supposedly from middle eastern Camels) came from similar origins.

Unfortunately it's unlikely we'll ever know the truth as those that would know, both here and in China have too much to lose to ever disclose what they know.

quote:

And there is knowing and knowing. Where what is "known" and reported makes a difference.

Yes. What's new is that the WSJ and the NYT would recognize what is "known".

For a deeper dive into the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA), and US Government (DoD/BARDA) involvement see Sasha Latypova.

https://sashalatypova.substack...hing-and-quick-links

I’ve known all along that it was developed in a lab - virus’ do not develop their own gain of function characteristics on their own.

Faucci funded it by illegally diverting US funds to the Wuhan lab

Faucci is responsible for everything that happened

Why would anyone want to take a disease that is not transmittable to humans and reengineer it?

I’m not convinced the leak was a mistake - I believe it was a deliberate act on the part of the Chinese who did everything they could to cover it up. Including allowing the virus to spread by allowing unrestricted travel to and from European countries.

Bluntly, I believe that the Chinese launched a bio weapon and why they haven’t been nuked into extinction is beyond me.

I'm convinced that Covid was cooked up and released specifically to take Trump out. Remember two things were true in January 2020; 1. Trump was flying high and headed to easy reelection and 2. His tariffs and other economic actions were starting to really kick the Chicom's butts

^^^ I agree. Hate to sound tin foil hat, but I believe it was a global plan to stop him from keeping America great.

Remember Hanlon's razor: Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity.

I don't buy the virus being released to take down Trump, because the virus was out by August 2019. It may well have been released intentionally, and that suggests the hypothesis that the real goal was to deploy the jab. The ultra-fast timing of having the viral genes sequenced and the jab products developed just cannot be explained by anything other than prior knowledge of the virus, and the insanity of the jabs suggests intentional harm.

But once the virus was known, the US government responses and statements have an interesting arc. First came statements of "don't worry, just a flu, we'll be ok", followed within a day or two with "OMG SHELTER IN PLACE". This strongly suggests that the insiders realized that it was a gain of function product not just some random natural virus. GOF means bio-weapon, and that means it could kill huge numbers of people. The people in the know obviously knew or suspected something, and interestingly it turned out not to be nearly so bad as their reaction says they thought it would be. Iow, once they realized it was a bioweapon which they certainly assisted in creating, they panicked. Luckily it wasn't as deadly as they feared, but that is just dumb luck. Their panic was never justified by any facts known at any time.

But then, politicians realized the powerful weapon it could be against DJT. All of a sudden everything he said was vilified. First he was racist for wanting to restrict travel from Wuhan, then he wasn't taking the deadliness seriously enough.

From around the end of February 2020 it was a political weapon against Trump without doubt. Every move was calculated to harm Trump, public good be damned.

quote:

Their goal was to identify bat viruses in Asia with the highest potential for jumping to people and to immunize bats so they wouldn’t infect soldiers in the region.

What a bunch of hogwash. Who do they think they were fooling?

Fauci was Nostradamus apparently. The plandemic was a surprise to everyone but him and his plotters. This was entirely planned and released on the world with purpose. He would have been smarter just to shut up and not make his prediction and just went forward with his plan. But his ego would not allow that kind of logic to enter his mind.

I see one basic problem with the overall discussion around the world.

On one side, you have experts who suspect and point to the evidence that COVID 19 was man-made in a lab and on the other, you have experts who do know and obfuscate the evidence that COVID 19 was man-made in a lab.

I know you’ve all seen this, but it’s worth noting that Stewart’s appearance on the show was almost 3 years ago.

Who holds the patent on the Wuhan virus?

Faucci

quote:

Originally posted by nhtagmember:
Who holds the patent on the Wuhan virus?

Faucci

That little demon needs to be tried, convicted, and executed.

It’s frustrating how long it takes for the truth to emerge. By the time it does, the damage is already done and the guilty have escaped