The monkey escape from a SC breeding/research facility raises biosafety questions. As I detail in my book Pandora’s Gamble, “disease free” breeding colony monkeys at another facility became infected – even though they were never used in experiments🧵1/9
postandcourier.com/beaufort-count… I initially wrote about this other troubling case at the Tulane National Primate Research Center for @USATODAY. It should have been impossible for Tulane's breeding colony monkeys to become infected from experiments done far from their outdoor cages…2/9 usatoday.com/story/news/201…

Poliovirus lab leak? “A poliovirus that infected a 4-year old child in China in 2014 may have originated in a research laboratory or a vaccine production facility.” 🧵

science.org/content/articl…
Other examples include the 1977 strain of influenza virus - one nearly identical to a strain that had circulated in 1950:

🧵Fascinating origin-of-Covid testimony from renowned coronavirus expert Ralph Baric. “The single biggest issue to jump from the pages of Baric’s testimony is his persistent concern over unsafe research practices at the WIV,” writes @katherineeban vanityfair.com/news/story/ral… Baric, who collaborated with the Wuhan Institute of Virology, is unconvinced by research hyped by major news organizations + a vocal group of scientists that purports to have all-but-proven Covid-19 came from a Wuhan market. He testified their work has “major problem” w/ timeline

Several interesting details in new @AP @dakekang report on China’s efforts to derail investigations into the source of the Covid-19 pandemic. “China’s quest for control of its researchers, and global tensions have all led to silence when it comes to…COVID-19’s origins.” 1/ Worth reading the story found here: Details include “WHO officials heard of an earlier inspection of the market on Dec. 25, 2019.” And that “China refused a visa for Ben Embarek, then WHO’s top animal virus expert.” 2/apnews.com/article/china-…

Next week the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic will hold a hearing to evaluate the effectiveness of current biosafety & biosecurity practices. I've covered biosafety + lab accidents for 15 years and such hearings used to be bipartisan...🧵1/oversight.house.gov/release/wenstr… The @USGAO has been warning for years about the fragmented lab oversight structure in the United States. This 2014 GAO testimony should be required reading: gao.gov/products/gao-1…

Several measures targeting oversight of safety at biological research labs - plus a new #FOIA exemption for lab accident data - are part of Pandemic & All-Hazards Preparedness & Response Act reauthorization bill receiving hearing today by @GOPHELP @HELPCmteDems. More in this🧵 Bill would create a “No-Fault Reporting System” for biolab accidents + make information collected exempt from public disclosure under the Freedom of Information Act. Also calls for review of Federal Select Agent Program + a proposal for creating an integrated oversight framework.

New book reveals lax oversight + efforts to avoid reporting lab accident with a controversial gain-of-function H5N1 flu virus. (A first excerpt from Pandora’s Gamble is in @USATODAY) 1/ via @usatodayusatoday.com/story/opinion/… Not long after the Kawaoka lab at the University of Wisconsin was allowed to resume work in 2019 with its infamous lab-created H5N1 virus – the one that had helped spark the worldwide debate over gain-of-function research in 2011 – there was an accident.

“If you stand back and look at the big picture, the science is rapidly outpacing the policy and the guardrails,’’ said James Le Duc, who has led research US Army + CDC + maximum-containment lab complex at the University of Texas at Galveston. washingtonpost.com/investigations… On one project: “The goal was to identify unknown viruses that might someday threaten humans. But doubts about the safety of the research began to simmer after the virus hunters were repeatedly bitten by bats and, in 2016, when another worker stuck herself with a needle…”

Happening now: @mujschool @IRE_NICAR Hurley Symposium on reporting on threats to democracy. First up: @JoshMeyerDC talking about cybersecurity. .@danielle_ivory details some helpful sources for reporting on election deniers + skeptics.

And now this on the recent Covid origins media reporting on a group of researchers’ analysis of China CDC environmental sampling data. Data group: “Premature discussions of the scientific data in the media risks eroding the public’s confidence in scientific research.”

https://twitter.com/mvankerkhove/status/1638201398935289856

And this:

https://twitter.com/flodebarre/status/1638199286700601345?s=46&t=nIluyHIcDygQqAxHkwyp6w

More pushback from @WHO on yesterday’s @nature article saying the Covid origins investigation has been quietly shelved. Yet the article still stands, without correction as of this AM - which may indicate the publisher believes reporting was accurate. (nature.com/articles/d4158…)

https://twitter.com/mvankerkhove/status/1625833887329812482

Earlier:

https://twitter.com/alisonannyoung/status/1625473474557886465?s=46&t=Ab3wfNcycHeMk-f0gbhz5w

In the wake of US shooting down alleged Chinese spy balloon, China says more than 10 US balloons flew in its airspace. apnews.com/article/china-… From a US National Security Council spokesperson:

https://twitter.com/nsc_spox/status/1625105964239056897?s=46&t=k4igeLFkfMFL2xOR9dCnNg

“Critics view pathogen research as the Wild West of science. Virologists have faced online abuse and even death threats amid fears that what they do is dangerous,” writes ⁦@JoelAchenbach⁩. But it’s not just those traditionally labeled as critics…1/ washingtonpost.com/health/2023/01… Even one of the ultimate insiders in the funding of biological research - @JeremyFarrar - noted there are “Wild West” sectors of research in discussing a possible lab origin in Wuhan.

Troubling example of how federal agencies -- regularly + increasingly with each administration -- redact information from documents that the public has every right to see. How legit are other redactions in Fauci's emails? ronjohnson.senate.gov/services/files… #FOIA #FOIAFriday h/t @thackerpd Last month I reported on a secretive 2/1/20 meeting that Dr. Fauci helped organize among elite, international scientists to discuss early concerns the Covid-19 virus might have been engineered in a lab. Those emails were also heavily redacted.
usatoday.com/story/opinion/…

To journalists + many scientists, the prestige of the writers of a key scientific journal article and the certainty of their words made it seem the science was settled dismissing the lab-leak theory. A backstory that raises even more questions:
usatoday.com/story/opinion/… The degree to which legitimate questions + discussion was shut down (until the very recent deluge of attention) makes no sense, given the history of lab accidents, limited oversight of biological research and long concerns about outbreak risks.
usatoday.com/in-depth/opini…

Why won't UNC disclose details of genetic modifications to the SARS-associated coronavirus in this 2016 BSL-3 lab incident? What's the virus description under this redaction in records sent to me + @JessicaEBlake in response to our records request? propublica.org/article/near-m… #FOIA The NIH Guidelines require labs that work with genetically modified viruses and bacteria to make public certain safety records -- including incident reports. It's a condition of their federal research funding. osp.od.nih.gov/wp-content/upl…

Could the pandemic have started with a lab accident in Wuhan? Safety breaches with coronaviruses at a US research partner lab show how it’s possible for potentially infected workers to move about in public. propublica.org/article/near-m… Records show at least 8 UNC researchers were required to undergo medical monitoring because of potential exposures to lab-crated SARS and MERS coronaviruses from 2015-2019. Records we obtained indicate they went about their lives in public.