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An aerial view shows the P4 (C) laboratory on the campus of the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan in central China’s Hubei Province on May 27, 2020. Photo: Hector Ritamal (Getty Images)
The debate over the origins of Covid-19 is reaching its climax. On Monday, The Wall Street Journal published an article describing a report circulating within the US government last year that found a virus research lab in Wuhan, China could be the source of the epidemic. At the same time, though, nothing seems to have changed much when it comes to the actual evidence of the virus’ source.
According to the WSJ, the report in question was prepared by Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, a federal research facility in California, in May 2020. It was later referenced in an assessment conducted by the State Department towards the end of Trump’s presidency. The report looked at the genetics of the coronavirus known as SARS-CoV-2 and concluded that “the hypothesis claiming the virus had leaked from a Chinese laboratory in Wuhan” was plausible and merits further investigation, according to the article. However, Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory did not respond to a request for comment from the Wall Street Journal.
Monday’s Wall Street Journal reporting should not be confused with a problematic article from its opening office published on Sunday titled: “Science Suggests Leak in Wuhan Lab.” In the opinion piece, Stephen Quay and Richard Mueller argue that SARS-CoV-2 contains “a genetic fingerprint that has never been observed in natural coronaviruses.” Both Quay and Muller had scientific training, but it appears Quay’s major is breast cancer research, and Muller’s earlier claim to fame as a physicist and climate change denier later changed his mind.
Some other scientists have already criticized the main premise of the editorial, that SARS-CoV-2 contains a unique trait known as the furin cleavage site that could not have arisen in the naturally evolving coronavirus. In a Twitter thread on Monday, trained evolutionary biologist and Nature News reporter Amy Maxmen said that one piece of genetic code referenced in the WSJ article, called the CGG code, is “rare in coronaviruses but present” and in a letter to Nature Medicine last year, Virologist Christian Anderson and evolutionary biologist Andrew Rambaut, among others, have argued that some genetic traits found in SARS-CoV-2 may be relatively rare among coronaviruses, but that they can still be explained by natural mutation or recombination.
Contrary to right-wing misinformation, some scientists have taken the possibility of a lab leak seriously since early in the pandemic. Unfortunately, much of this early discussion was wasted in having to address unsupported assertions that the virus was clearly genetically modified or deliberately released as a biological weapon mixed with HIV. Other than that, there appears to be only circumstantial evidence that a lab accident could have infected a larger number of the population with the virus. The Wuhan Institute of Virology has already worked with coronaviruses, for example, and some scientists working there appear to have contracted flu-like illness around the time the first known cases of the outbreak appeared in November.
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However, there is also circumstantial evidence for a theory of natural origin, and many scientists still believe that an animal origin – meaning that the virus appeared in an animal and then passed to humans, possibly through an intermediate host – remains the most likely scenario. In fact, this happens all the time. Some have also warned that we may never find out the truth or that it may take many years to find a natural reservoir, if one exists.
Regardless of the virus’ origin, the Chinese government continues to do a cover-up: In the first weeks and months of the outbreak, government officials attempted to censor scientists, doctors, and citizens who tried to warn the public about the danger of the new disease. But China’s guilt hardly absolves the United States and other countries from their failures once the virus reaches its doorstep.
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