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Coronavirus and the Virus Lab in Wuhan

Scientists overwhelmingly agree that the coronavirus that causes COVID-19
emerged from an animal, probably a bat. Some skeptics have challenged
the scienti c consensus, speculating that the coronavirus escaped from a
Wuhan research laboratory. They note that as the virus was spreading in
January 2020, China’s military sent its top epidemiologist to the Wuhan In-
stitute of Virology. And in February President Xi demanded stronger biosafety
rules to control viruses in laboratory settings. The skeptics see these clues as
a possible connection between the coronavirus and the Institute of Virology.
The deputy director of the institute scoffed at the idea that the virus came
from her laboratory. Shi Zhengli, called the “bat woman” for her work with
viruses in bats, insisted that she rst encountered the novel coronavirus in
December 2019 and that she and her colleagues had never seen it before.
On September 14, 2020, Li-Meng Yan, a Chinese virologist in Hong
Kong, posted online that the coronavirus was human-made in a Chinese
lab. Yan claimed she got her information from local doctors working with
the China CDC. “The market in Wuhan . . . is a smoke screen and this virus
is not from nature,” she says. For now, the real origin of the coronavirus
remains a mystery.

Quoted in Tamar Lapin, “Chinese Virologist Posts Report Claiming COVID-19 Was Made in Wuhan Lab,” New York
Post, September 14, 2020. www.nypost.com.

mented cases were linked to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Mar-
ket. This was a so-called wet market in Wuhan where seafood,
animals, and birds were sold. The market featured a variety of ex-
otic wildlife, with animals in cages and carcasses hung in the open
air for buyers’ inspection. Everything from beavers and porcupines
to snakes and baby crocodiles could be purchased there.
Among the fi rst cases of coronavirus in Wuhan was a fi fty-
seven-year-old seafood vendor at the Huanan market named Wei
Guixian. On December 10, 2019, Wei felt ill with fever and walked
to a small clinic nearby for treatment. Within eight days she was

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