Severe acute respiratory syndrome‐coronavirus (SARS‐CoV)‐2′s origin is still controversial. Genomic analyses show SARS‐CoV‐2 likely to be chimeric, most of its sequence closest to bat CoV RaTG13, whereas its receptor binding domain (RBD) is almost identical to that of a pangolin CoV. Chimeric viruses can arise via natural recombination or human intervention.
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Newly obtained emails offer glimpses into how a narrative of certainty developed about the natural origins of the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2, while key scientific questions remained. The internal discussions and an early draft of a scientists’ letter show experts discussing gaps in knowledge and unanswered questions about lab origin, even as some sought to tamp down on “fringe” theories about the possibility the virus came from a lab.
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In our recent profile of Bill Gates, we posed the following questions:
• Were his eerily accurate predictions of COVID-19 a form of wish fulfillment?
• Was he simply prescient, or did he have a hand in shaping the conditions that made the pandemic inevitable?
Most importantly, since SARS-CoV-2 may have escaped from a Chinese lab where gain-of-function experiments on bat
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We find ourselves ten months into one of the most catastrophic global health events of our lifetime and, disturbingly, we still do not know how it began. What’s even more troubling is that despite the critical importance of this question, efforts to investigate the origins of the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2) virus and of the associated disease, coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), have become mired in politics, poorly supported assumptions and assertions, and incomplete information.
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Emails obtained by U.S. Right to Know show that a statement in The Lancet authored by 27 prominent public health scientists condemning “conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin” was organized by employees of EcoHealth Alliance, a non-profit group that has received millions of dollars of U.S. taxpayer funding to genetically manipulate coronaviruses with scientists at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
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U.S. Right to Know (USRTK), an investigative public health nonprofit group, has filed a lawsuit1 against the National Institutes of Health after the agency failed to respond to the USRTK's July 10, 2020, Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request. According to the NIH, records were withheld due to them being part of an ongoing legal investigation.
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Almost a year has passed since the outbreak of COVID-19. The coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 started its journey in the city of Wuhan, China, and since then it infected over 50 million people worldwide, killing 2.5% of them (Johns Hopkins data). Scientists are largely convinced it has a natural origin, but there are many things we still do not know.
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On November 9, 2020, U.S. Right to Know released emails with senior authors of Liu et al. and Xiao et al., and staff and editors at PLoS Pathogens and Nature journals. These studies have provided scientific credence to the zoonotic hypothesis that coronaviruses closely related to SARS-CoV-2 circulate in the wild, and that SARS-CoV-2 has a wild animal source.
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Since the outbreak of COVID-19 in the Chinese city of Wuhan in December 2019, scientists have searched for clues about what led to the emergence of its causative agent, the novel coronavirus SARS-CoV-2. Uncovering the source of SARS-CoV-2 could be crucial for preventing future outbreaks.
A series of four high profile studies published earlier this year provided scientific credence to the hypothesis that SARS-CoV-2 originated in bats and then jumped to humans through a type of anteater called a pangolin —
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Dr. Anthony Fauci is a medical doctor who has been the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) since 1984. He’s best known in his current role as a member of the White House Coronavirus Task Force.
Early in the COVID-19 pandemic, Americans put their faith in Fauci. His bedside manner―straightforward, modest and unassuming―made it easy to warm up to this grandfatherly nerd. Inspiring trust that he was unbiased, non-partisan and strictly scientific, he quickly became “America’s
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