Thread by @michaelzlin

As my followers know, I try to stick to facts and not overinterpret them. But to hide early Wuhan patient coronavirus sequences, the exact info promised to @WHO, isn't just evidence of cover-up. It *is* cover-up.

https://twitter.com/jbloom_lab/status/1407445604029009923

If the excuse for deleting sequences is they're being saved for papers, that doesn't hold water. You can just post to biorxiv to claim priority. And it's 15 months now when we know journals can publish something in 15 days if it's clearly important. "Proximal origins" anyone?

Finally just cautioning that suppression of info doesn't prove the virus must be a known lab leak. It does however indicate a recognition of the possibility of guilt. At the very least PR China is afraid where the evidence will lead so they're burying it and not gathering more.

P.S. A reminder that PR China enacted a policy requiring papers related to COVID-19 origins be approved by some institutional body. So that policy provides an effective mechanism to silence academics. And then withholding info promised to @WHO demonstrates PR China's deceit.

Actually the fact that there was no early coverup, allowing the sequences to be posted, supports the idea that PR China did not know the origins of SARSCoV2 at that time either. But perhaps later as zoonotic evidence remained elusive they realized lab leak was a possibility.

Also the timing of the central review requirement for papers on SARSCoV2 origins and of the sequence deletion refutes the assertions of certain virologists/zoologists that discussing a lab leak possibility in 2021 was what prevented China from sharing more info.

Indeed today's paper by @jbloom_lab is a 9.0 earthquake in our search for understanding of COVID-19 origins. It's very illuminating now to go back and see find the past false statements, i.e. lies, in light of the new data.

After the 2021/02 WHO trip, China claimed to have been transparent in origin tracing: “We wish that the U.S. side can, like China, uphold an open and transparent attitude, and be able to invite WHO experts to the U.S. to conduct origin tracing research"
reuters.com/article/us-hea…

What the WHO team got from Chinese authorities: "They also supplied aggregated data and analysis on retrospective searches through medical records in the months before the Wuhan outbreak was identified, saying that they had found no evidence of the virus."
wsj.com/articles/china…

You can also see a certain member of the @WHO team failing to use critical thinking in evaluating the quality of data he is being given. Good scientists need to always assess data reliability and leave room for unknown unknowns!
nytimes.com/2021/02/14/hea…

So today's data fetch and dump by @jbloom_lab clearly shows that Chinese authorities knew of earlier cases, but lied to @WHO @PeterDaszak and @MarionKoopmans by saying they had found no other cases, then lied to the world by saying they had been transparent.

@jbloom_lab @WHO @PeterDaszak @MarionKoopmans Sadly, I suspect an order is going out right now to wipe hard drives in research institutes across China

And... I think we can drop the "theory" and just say "conspiracy"

P.P.S. To be precise the data Bloom found are from samples of unknown collection date. However the sequences indicate earlier diversification of viruses than the cluster at the Huanan market suggested, so pushes back the timeline. This was not revealed to the WHO team.

And I'm sorry to interrupt my normal focus on COVID-19 vaccines and treatments, but this was too important not to discuss immediately. And the COVID-19 tweets in turn are interrupting my normal protein engineering tweets, but COVID-19 happened, even though none of us asked for it

But it's like clockwork... the day that I finally clear my schedule so I can start writing a paper or grant, some big COVID-19 bombshell has to fall. It feels like being in the Truman Show, or the Matrix. Not a day without drama.

If you want comments on record and in print, other scientists are chiming in
telegraph.co.uk/global-health/…

Makes yesterday's tweet by @PeterHotez even more relevant

https://twitter.com/PeterHotez/status/1407139997812199430

Just noticed that we've avoided the more inflammatory allegations that previously arose around SARSCoV2 origins. The thread has stayed focused on discussing the data and how to interpret patient and sequence info not being provided to WHO. The discussion is maturing, a good sign.

Some may still think using the term cover-up to describe the refusal to collect and share standard information is unnecessary. But there is no choice. Violations of agreements, promises, and research norms are happening, and are only going to continue if not called out.