Is considering a genetic-manipulation origin for SARS-CoV-2 a conspiracy theory that must be censored?
That is the title of a new scientific analysis of the structure of SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic.
In the course of answering that question, the authors provide unequivocal evidence that SARS-CoV-2 was not naturally-occurring.
The theory that the Wuhan’s Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market was the first source for animal–human viral transmission, long promoted by China, some Western scientists and the media, is now totally discredited, even by the Chinese Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.
The claim that COVID-19 is a naturally-occurring outbreak has been based, nearly entirely, on a single, but widely-cited scientific article entitled “The Proximal Origin of SAR-CoV-2,” the arguments of which are thoroughly dissected and dismantled by the authors of the present study.
Although China is now promoting a new “multiple origin” theory based on alleged genetic differences observed in the virus taken from a small sample of Chinese COVID-19 patients and published in March and May, the validity and significance of those findings are already in dispute.
There remains no credible scientific evidence that the COVID-19 pandemic was naturally-occurring.
The evidence to the contrary, that the coronavirus responsible, SARS-CoV-2, was man-made is now substantial.
The most conspicuous sign of genetic manipulation is the presence of a furin polybasic cleavage site in SARS-CoV-2, a structure that is not present in any of the coronaviruses so far identified as possible recent ancestors.
According to the new study, the furin site was created by a genetic, nucleotide insertion that coded for amino acids proline, arginine, arginine, alanine (PRRA). The two arginines are coded by nucleotide “codons,” consisting of a sequence of three nucleotides each, CGG-CGG.
The codon CGG is rare. Only 5% of arginines are coded by CGG in SARS-CoV-2 or its closest identified bat coronavirus relative, RaTG13 and it is the only instance of a double CGG-CGG codon.
Also, the CGG-CGG insert includes a FauI restriction site, of which there are six instances in SAR-CoV-2, a “marker” used in cloning and the screening of genetic mutations.
Engineering of the cleavage sites can make a coronavirus more dangerous because furin is an enzyme found in multiple human organ systems.
Such a modification may have given SARS-CoV-2 the ability to infect cells and organs otherwise insensitive to unaltered coronaviruses.
Furthermore, the authors suggest that SARS-CoV-2 is a chimer, an artificially-created virus consisting of a pangolin (scaly anteater) receptor protein “spliced” onto a bat coronavirus backbone.
This ground-breaking article concludes:
“Due to the gravity of SARS-CoV-2 impact on humanity, researchers have the responsibility to carry out a thorough analysis, beyond any personal research interests, of all possible causes for SARS-CoV-2 emergence. Unfortunately, theories that consider a possible artificial origin for SARS-CoV-2 are censored by international scientific journals as they seem to support conspiracy theories. Genetic manipulation of SARS-CoV-2 may have been carried out in any laboratory in the world with access to the backbone sequence and the necessary equipment. New technologies based on synthetic genetics platforms even allow the reconstruction of viruses based on their genomic sequence, without the need of a natural isolate.”
Either the coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2, responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic, is the product of a highly improbable and still unknown sequence of naturally-occurring coincidences or it is a laboratory creation.
You decide.
Lawrence Sellin, Ph.D. is a retired U.S. Army Reserve colonel, who previously worked at the U.S. Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases and conducted basic and clinical research in the pharmaceutical industry. His email address is lawrence.sellin@gmail.com.
The views expressed in CCNS member articles are not necessarily the views or positions of the entire CCNS. They are the views of the authors, who are members of the CCNS.
