Covid most likely came from lab leak amid 'unusual' activity, new study reveals

15 March 2024 , 13:10

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A research team believes Covid-19 is more likely to have had an ‘unnatural’ origin than a ‘natural’ one (Image: Getty Images)

Covid-19 most likely originated in a lab, a new study has concluded.

The origin of the pandemic has long been contentious. Some believe the virus was zoonotic and spread from animals to humans, such as via the wet market in Wuhan, China. Others believe it leaked, accidentally or otherwise, from a laboratory – namely the Wuhan Institute of Virology, also in China.

Now, scientists have discovered that Covid-19 is more likely to have had an ‘unnatural’ origin than a ‘natural’ one. A research team used an established risk analysis tool called the Grunow-Finke assessment to create a likelihood scale for possible pandemic causes.

Results from the assessment pointed to the virus having an ‘unnatural’ origin – with the fact that the first infections were in the vicinity of laboratories studying coronaviruses noted as one of the strongest indications. The study highlights that the first cases of Covid-19 were reported in Wuhan, China, on December 30 2019 – all within close proximity of both the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) and the Wuhan Center for Disease Control and Prevention (WHCDC).

Dr Xin Chen, a researcher at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Australia, said: “The WIV had been conducting experiments involving SARS-like coronavirus in bats since 2010. One of the bat viruses being studied at the WIV shares a 96.1 per cent homology with SARS-CoV-2, something which was only revealed after the pandemic began.

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“The WIV was only eight miles away from the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market, where some of the initial cases were linked to. The WHCDC was also studying coronaviruses, and on 2 December 2019, less than a month before the first infections, it moved to a location 280m from the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market. A move may have increased the chance of a laboratory accident.”

Dr Chen added that although some scientists use the outbreak at the wet market as an indication of a ‘natural’ or zoonotic origin, several of the first infected people had not visited Huanan. “This points to the possibility that Huanan was a source of an amplification event, rather than 105 the origin of SARS-CoV-2,” he said. "It is also worth noting that evidence of an intermediary animal host – necessary for this theory – is lacking.”

The team also highlighted ‘unusual’ actions by scientists working at the WIV as a factor pointing to a lab leak origin of Covid-19. Dr Abrar Chughtai, an epidemiologist at the University of New South Wales, explained: “In September 2019, control of the WIV lab was handed over from civilian to military command and control, and a contractor was hired to renovate the ventilation system within the facility.

“Simultaneously, for reasons unknown, the WIV removed a large virus database containing approximately 20,000 specimens from bats and mice that had previously been accessible to the public. It is unclear whether the database included sequences that could be relevant to the origin of SARS-CoV-2 and whether any attempt was made to cover it up.”

He added that 'not all requested information', such as laboratory records, was made available to the team from the World Health Organisation tasked with investigating the origins of Covid-19 in 2021. Dr Chughtai also pointed to instances of ‘poor’ biosecurity procedures at the WIV.

“Some scientists did not follow proper protective equipment protocols while handling bats and were bitten by them,” he said. “And, in early November 2019, some staff members from the institute were hospitalised with Covid-19-like symptoms.”

Dr Chandini Raina Macintyre, another epidemiologist at UNSW, also highlighted inconsistencies in remarks from scientists who initially advocated for the likelihood of a ‘natural’ Covid-19 origin. “Freedom of Information requests in the US revealed that virologists who publicly stated that SARS-COV-2 had a natural origin simultaneously privately communicated doubts about this to each other, discussing the fact that research at WIV could have led to the creation of SARS-COV-2," she said.

“It is possible that US funding of some of the research at WIV was a motivation for the public messaging about natural origins to be promoted and discussion of a lab accident to be suppressed.” The study, published today in the journal Risk Analysis, admits that its Grunow-Finke assessment cannot prove that Covid-19 leaked from one of the two labs in Wuhan.

However, it also argues that the risk factors outlined throughout the assessment cannot be dismissed. Dr Chen said: “Laboratory accidents are common, and, if the pathogen in question is highly contagious, it is possible that an accidentally infected worker can set off an epidemic in the community.

“The fact that the first cluster of cases were in the vicinity of a world leading coronavirus laboratory, known to be experimenting on SARS-like viruses, as well as a second lab which was also working on coronaviruses, points to an unnatural origin.”