John Solomon;
Scientists are entertaining the possibility that SARS-CoV-2 not only leaked from a lab but had been genetically modified, based on new research into the “peculiar pattern of unique restriction endonuclease recognition sites” in the virus.
This pattern allows “efficient dis- and re-assembly of the viral genome characteristic of synthetic viruses,” according to the Oct. 20 preprint by mathematical biologist Alex Washburne, Duke University pharmacologist Antonius VanDongen and University of Wurzburg molecular immunologist Valentin Bruttel.
The “fingerprint” of this “stitching” and the “pattern of mutations generating them are extremely unlikely in wild coronaviruses and nearly universal in synthetic viruses,” the researchers wrote.
“The BsaI/BsmBI restriction map of SARS-CoV-2 is unlike any wild-type coronavirus, and it is unlikely to evolve from its closest relatives.” […]
“I tried to poke holes in this study, really hard, and I hate its findings,” University College London Genetics Institute Director Francois Balloux wrote in a tweet thread that concluded the preprint “looks solid both conceptually and methodologically.”
Balloux said he was “able to replicate the key findings” and called the paper “by far the strongest piece of evidence to date against a simple scenario of strict zoonotic origin.” He predicted “Covid twitter will combust in an implosion of rage and fury over this preprint.”
And,
Fauci’s official work calendar from November 2019 to March 2020 suggests he feared the virus didn’t have natural origin, according to Open the Books, which recently obtained the document through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit.
It shows Fauci had several previously unreported “top-secret” and “restricted” meetings with the National Security Council in January and February 2020, in venues including the White House Situation Room. Do these meetings “give the impression people-in-the-know thought the virus had a natural origin?” Open the Books founder Adam Andrzejewski wrote.
See how they narrate: When the most likely explanation becomes “extraordinary claim”.