When the COVID pandemic broke out, the public was urged to listen to the "science" behind it, meaning to steer away from "conspiracy theories" that the coronavirus was of unnatural origins and was developed in a laboratory. Most recently however, more and more evidence points to the theory being a valid one and not just a conspiracy theory.
On Monday, a new report prepared by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in California showed how the genomic analysis of the coronavirus responsible for COVID showed that it was not of zoonotic origin and had most likely come from a laboratory.
An explosive report from the Wall Street Journal took a closer look at the study, which was conducted by the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in May 2020 and was referred to by the U.S. State Department during its investigation into COVID's origins towards the end of the Trump administration, CNBC reported.
Faithwire reported that according to the WSJ op-ed by Atossa Therapeutics founder Dr. Steven Quay and former Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory senior scientist Richard Muller, "the most compelling reason to favor the lab leak hypothesis is firmly based in science. In particular, consider the genetic fingerprint of CoV-2, the novel coronavirus responsible for the disease COVID-19."
Dr. Quay and Muller urged to listen to the science, writing, "scientific evidence that points to CoV-2's gain-of-function (research) origin," with the "most compelling" evidence being the "dramatic differences in the genetic diversity of CoV-2, compared with the coronaviruses responsible for SARS and MERS."
Both SARS and MERS, the outbreaks of which happened in 2000-2003 and 2012 respectively, had a natural origin and these viruses "evolved rapidly" as they spread through humans until the virus' "most contagious forms dominated."
But unlike SARS and MERS that evolved into a a contagious virus, COVID "appeared in humans already adapted into an extremely contagious version." Dr. Quay and Mueller called it an "unprecedented early optimization" as the virus had only developed different variants about nine or so months into the global pandemic.
Visual Capitalist identified and explained how the three major COVID variants appeared around the world. B.1.1.7 or Alpha appeared in the U.K. in the Fall of 2020, while B.1.351 or Beta was identified in South Africa in October 2020. The third major COVID variant P.1 was discovered in Brazil in January 2021. Dr. Quay and Muller argue that the implications of these is that the virus had been grown on human cells to develop its optimal stage, a practice that is done in gain-of-function research.
The scientists who authored the WSJ op-ed also turned to a study by virologists Bruno Coutard and his colleagues, who pointed out how the coronavirus responsible for COVID had a "peculiar furin-like cleavage site" in its spike protein that was absent in other SARS-like coronaviruses. In it, the authors commented that its spike protein "may provide a gain-of-function" capability to the virus "for efficient spreading" to the human population.
President Joe Biden has already ordered U.S. intelligence to delve deeper into the possibility that COVID came from a Wuhan lab leak, which in recent weeks has been gaining traction following the emergence of reports that claim it is a credible theory.
It's worth noting, however, that Biden called for the investigation after issuing orders to ban the use of phrases "China virus" or "Wuhan virus" to refer to COVID in federal communications, as well as orders to shut down a Trump-era investigation that already found evidence indicating the virus did not have a zoonotic origin and that it came from a laboratory in Wuhan, China.
