A French study claims that COVID did not originate in the infamous bat cave in southern China, which is the center of the “laboratory leak” theory.
https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-10072881/Covid-did-NOT-originate-bat-cave-six-Chinese-miners-struck-mystery-flu.html
Daily Mail.
Mojian Cave was considered one of the possible locations for the coronavirus after it was revealed in 2012 that six miners who worked there fell ill with a mysterious flu-like illness.
Scientists from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) were sent to investigate at the time and sent bat samples back to the lab 1,000 miles away. One of the viruses they have collected is the closest known relative of the virus that causes COVID and has almost 97 percent similarity to its genetic makeup.
Proponents of the laboratory leak theory believe that either the miners were infected with an early version of COVID, or the pathogen that caused the pandemic was the result of experiments with viruses sent back to Wuhan.
But French researchers, after retrospectively examining the medical reports of miners at the time, now say that neither could be true. They said the symptoms were too different to be COVID and asked why no hospital staff member or close contacts of the miners got sick.
In their report, the French researchers pointed out: “One should also wonder why the virus, which killed more than 4 million people and infected more than 200 million in 18 months, did not cause any disease in 7 years from 2012 to 2019.”
They added that RATG13 – a virus that is very similar to COVID and was found in horseshoe bats in Mojian Cave – is not capable of infecting humans, and there is no evidence that working with it in the laboratory could give it that ability. …
However, one of the leading scientists behind the latest study was linked to a lab in Wuhan, which could create a conflict of interest, the Daily Mail notes.
Recall that six miners, stricken with a mysterious pneumonia, were sent to Mojiang Cave in Yunnan province in southwestern China to harvest bat guano in April 2012. They were between 30 and 63 years old, three of the cases died as a result of infection.
The latest study by Roger Frutos, a microbiologist at the French Center for Agricultural Research for International Development, says hospital records show “serious inconsistencies” between their illnesses and typical COVID symptoms.
The researchers pointed out that one of the characteristic symptoms of COVID is a dry cough, while the miners suffered from a very different type of cough. They were found to be coughing up blood or mucus. CT scans showed that they also did not have the same lung scar as many hospitalized coronavirus patients. All miners suffered from swollen lymph nodes in the chest or “water in the lungs” – such symptoms were noted in only less than 0.01 percent of patients with COVID.
“Thus, we reject the Mojian mine as the source of SARS-CoV-2,” the researchers concluded in an article published in the journal Environmental Research. “The abandonment of the Mojian mine theory leaves the laboratory leakage narrative without any scientific support, making it just an opinion-driven narrative.”
However, the researchers were accused of failing to refute the main claims of the laboratory leak theory. Professor David Livermore, a microbiologist at the University of East Anglia, comments on MailOnline: “The theory states that this virus [который заразил шахтеров]may have been the progenitor of SARS-CoV2 … not that it was SARS-CoV2 itself. So, some difference in pathology is not unfounded. “
The expert said he was still not sure if the laboratory leak theory was the most likely source of the virus. But he admitted there were some “wonderful coincidences.” He added, “The pandemic began in Wuhan, which is far from the bat caves in southern China, and houses the Institute of Virology, which is doing molecular work on coronaviruses, including enhancing functionality.”
These comments were supported by Professor Lawrence Young, a virologist at the University of Warwick, who said it was “quite possible” that the origin of COVID can be traced back to the caves in Modjan. He told MailOnline: “While I still think this is the result of natural spread of infection from an animal, a laboratory leak incident cannot be ruled out.”
Professor Livermore added that the laboratory version of the leak has gone from conspiracy theory to mainstream thought because extensive searches have failed to find any natural reservoir for SARS-CoV-2. He said it was also “important” to note that one of the authors of the article, Christian Deveaux, was involved in the creation of the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), which specializes in manipulating dangerous coronaviruses in so-called “enhancement of function” studies. These risky experiments involve creating viruses to make them more infectious or deadly, in the hopes of developing treatments and vaccines to stay ahead of outbreaks.
But French researchers say the RATG13 pathogen, first discovered in horseshoe bats in Mojian Cave, is unlikely to have been used to create COVID. They said that while this is real, the viral particles have not been isolated from animals, which means that researchers only have samples of its genetic code, not physical copies of the virus itself.
“Therefore, there is no evidence that this sequence corresponds to any real and viable virus, or even that all reads come from the same virus,” the study authors wrote. – RATG13 has never been isolated as a virus or replicated in cell cultures. It has no physical existence and, therefore, could not escape from the laboratory. “
But there are still questions about the Mojian Caves, the Daily Mail notes. Attempts by Western journalists to visit the caves have been rejected, and the Chinese authorities are closely monitoring the caves.
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