Archive for July, 2022

Learning About Health Freedom From Utah & Tanzania

https://credenceonline.co.uk/ecpages/report-from-tanzania-more-good-news-from-africa/

Report From Tanzania – More Good News From Africa!

Former Tanzanian President John Pombe Magufuli.

by Bushiri

AUTHOR’S NOTE: whilst reading the following, it would behoove the reader to bear in mind that President John Magufuli was one of the most popular African leaders of recent history. His support base amongst ordinary people was real and enormous, due to his genuine warmth, his determination to put the people first and to rid his country of corruption, fat cats and government idleness.

Just ask yourself: Which other leader anywhere in the world has ever voluntarily HALVED his own salary and given the other half to worthy causes? Magufuli did that, and a lot more besides, throughout his entire five-and-a-half-years’ presidency.

And such was his success at pulling his country up by the bootstraps that he was known locally, and affectionately, as “the bulldozer.”

It is almost one year now since the assassination of the world’s one and only sovereign leader who waged open warfare against the COVID-19 Cabal.

This is a first-hand account of the situation on the ground in Tanzania since the hit squad was sent in to eliminate the only leader who fought the Cabal and their ‘vaccines’ head-on, out in the open, from day one…

Within a few weeks of President Magufuli’s murder, his replacement, Samia Suluhu Hassan, a female World Economic Forum attendee, set about installing the Cabal’s COVID agenda. It was a thoroughly depressing experience. I know. I was there to see it.

Gone forever were Magufuli’s maskless smile and palpable warmth, replaced now by daily images of a cold, insentient president and her entire entourage all muzzled, as per the Cabal’s orders.

In rapid succession, in came the following:

  • a campaign of fear launched by the media

  • images of ‘COVID patients’ in hospitals

  • tight COVID controls at the country’s airports and borders

  • directives to force the public to wear face masks

  • face masks in all government buildings

  • a masked police force

  • masks in hospitals

  • antisocial distancing

  • masks in schools

  • masks in the streets

  • no handshakes

  • public transport forced to operate at half capacity

  • messages from government on our mobile phones, warning us about COVID and promoting the ‘vaccine’

  • palpable fear between old friends and families

  • import of COVID ‘vaccines’ banned under Magufuli

“She is poison,” were words often heard in the street when Tanzanians compared the new WEF-appointed president with Magufuli.

But then, after just one week, something happened. Something truly remarkable…
After just one week of all the fear and insanity, the people of Tanzania had had enough.

(See link for article)

_____________________

**Comment**

I wrote previously about the beloved president of Tanzania, John Magufuli, RIP, and the fact the man had a PhD in Chemistry.  A bit of a prankster, he punked the WHO and proved the worthlessness of PCR for diagnosing by testing fruit, goats, sheep, and motor oil for COVID.  Nearly half came back positive.  He wouldn’t bow to the ‘powers that be’, went missing and died mysteriously.

SUMMARY:

  • Suffocating, masked Tanzanian police thew their masks in the trash.
  • The people on the street were having none of Hassan’s fear-mongering and were out in the streets engaging in peaceful, silent, civil disobedience – leaving everyone smiling.
  • All of Tanzania, 50 MILLION people,  simply stopped complying.
  • Children and workers are unmasked and the police don’t care.
  • Markets are full of smiling people buying and selling, hugging, and hand-shaking.
  • When the government ordered medical staff to launch ‘outreach programs” to educate the public they learned that the villagers apparently oblivious to COVID were fit, muscular, and healthy working under the fields day after day.  The doctor in charge quickly concluded that it was the medical staff that were the ones that needed a lecture on health.  They promptly got in their vehicles and drove away. 

Category:

Activism, vaccines, Viruses

Trainee Pilot Dead After Mosquito Bite

https://www.bbc.com/news/uk-england-suffolk-62065525

Trainee pilot from Suffolk died after mosquito bite, inquest hears

Oriana Pepper at the controls of an airplaneFamily Photo

Oriana Pepper’s family said she “loved nothing better than to go flying”

A trainee commercial airline pilot died after she was bitten by a mosquito and developed an infection that spread to her brain, an inquest heard.

Oriana Pepper, 21, of Bury St Edmunds, Suffolk, died five days after she was bitten while in Antwerp, Belgium last July.

Suffolk’s senior coroner Nigel Parsley said it was an “unfortunate tragedy for a young lady who clearly had a wonderful career ahead of her”.

(See link for article)

____________________

**Comment**

I post this unfortunate story for a few reasons:

  • Ticks aren’t the only bugs that can kill you.
  • Location of the bite, IMO, is important.  If you are bitten on the head, neuro/cognitive issues can develop sometimes within hours.
  • This woman was prescribed antibiotics but had to go back to the hospital where she collapsed and died only three days later.
  • Cause of death was recorded as septic emboli in the brain by staphylococcus aureus which is abundant on the body and usually harmless, but is the leading cause of skin and soft tissue infections such as boils, furnuncles, and cellulitis.
  • The cause of death also mentioned an “insect bite to the forehead also contributing.“
  • The article says nothing about insect-transmitted pathogens or if they tested her for them but which probably played more of a role than is being given credit.
  • Lyme disease often mimics cellulitis.
  • Mosquitoes carry EEE, whicc can cause severe brain inflammation and has a mortality rate of 30%. Many who do recover continuing to have neurological problems. Six Wisconsin counties have reported cases in horses.

  • Mosquitoes also transmit Western equine encephalitis, St. Louis Encephalitis, and West Nile Fever to humans.
  • Please see the following regarding mosquitoes and Lyme disease:

…results show that DNA of Borrelia afzelii, Borrelia bavariensis and Borrelia garinii could be detected in ten Culicidae species comprising four distinct genera (Aedes, Culiseta, Culex, and Ochlerotatus). Positive samples also include adult specimens raised in the laboratory from wild-caught larvae indicating that transstadial and/or transovarial transmission might occur within a given mosquito population.

BTW: the last study on the potential of other bugs transmitting Lyme (minus the German study on mosquitos) was done over 30 years ago.  And, while no spirochetes were isolated from the hamsters, antibodies were found – even back then.

I would like to point out the extreme hypocrisy regarding antibodies. Regarding COVID, the PCR, an unmitigated disaster has been used daily for over two years to pick up antibodies. This faulty test which was never intended to diagnose patients has been used to quarantine people even if they aren’t sick.  When it comes to Lyme; however, finding antibodies in anything isn’t enough to prove infection.  Now why is that? 

One little detail is understanding the CDC owns patents on the very tests being used – demonstrating a clear conflict of interest. A few other details: the CDC only allows what serves its vested interests and conveniently disposes anything that doesn’t serve its purpose, and ignores science that doesn’t fit the accepted narrative. While blaming others, it blatantly and continually engages in “misinformation.”

Another ugly fly in the ointment is that according to Igor Kirillov, head of the Russian Armed Forces’ Radiation, Chemical and Biological Protection Unit, Ukrainian biological laboratories researched fever-carrying Aedes mosquitoes, the same genus of insects that the US is thought to have used to start a pandemic of type 2 dengue in Cuba in the 1970s and 1980s which killed 158 people and infected 345,000. The type 2 dengue had never been reported in the Caribbean region and the only location on the island free from the infection was the Guantanamo US military installation.

“The facts of the use of Aedes mosquitoes as biological weapons, exactly the same species with which the US Pentagon worked in Ukraine, were recorded in a class-action lawsuit by Cuban citizens against the US government and were submitted for reviewing of the signatories to the Convention on the Prohibition of Biological Weapons”, Kirillov said.  Source

Category:

Activism, mosquitoes, Transmission, Viruses

Ask A Lyme Doctor: Q & A With Dr. Tania Dempsey

https://www.globallymealliance.org/blog/dr.-tanya-dempsey-questions?

Ask a Lyme Doctor: Q&A with Dr. Tania Dempsey

by Dr. Tania Dempsey on June 2, 2022

<span id="hs_cos_wrapper_name" class="hs_cos_wrapper hs_cos_wrapper_meta_field hs_cos_wrapper_type_text" style="" data-hs-cos-general-type="meta_field" data-hs-cos-type="text" >Ask a Lyme Doctor: Q&A with Dr. Tania Dempsey</span>
Dr. Tania Dempsey is an expert in chronic disease, autoimmune disorders and mast cell activation syndrome. In this blog, she is answering Lyme related questions that GLA followers submitted via social media.
Are you seeing cases where Covid has re-activated Lyme or ignited new auto-immune diseases or mast cell activation syndrome? -Kimberly H.

We are just at the beginning of really understanding how COVID interacts with our immune system. Since there are few studies that have been published that give us complete clarity on this, much of what I discuss is based on my experience with my patients. What seems clear to me is there is often some sort of vulnerability or predisposition in the patient, like an autoimmune potential, underlying dysfunctional mast cells, or a history of chronic infections, that leads to the complications that we are seeing post-COVID. I have not yet seen post-COVID patients who did not have some hint of an underlying issue prior to COVID. I have patients who have a history of Lyme disease that is well controlled for a number of years but after COVID they see a recurrence in the symptoms that pre-dated their Lyme treatment. Some of these patients have new symptoms and I postulate that it could be related to their underlying old infection that reactivated in a new location in their body or the new symptoms represent a worsening of their immune dysfunction. COVID seems to both stimulate and suppress the immune system, depending on the timing of the infection and on the susceptibility of the person. If the patient has a history of Lyme disease that is chronic/persistent, we know that their immune system continues to be affected. The vast majority of Chronic Lyme patients (in my practice) have underlying dysfunction of their mast cells, even if they have not been formally diagnosed with mast cell activation syndrome. Many of them had a predisposition before being infected with Lyme, which was worsened by the infection. Since infections of various kinds are known to trigger mast cells, chronic infection can cause chronic mast cell activation that then can be triggered further by a new infection, such as COVID. The relationship between mast cells and other immune cells has been well described and MCAS can be a driver of the development of autoimmunity.

How should I deal with post Lyme flare ups? -Debra C.

There are three main scenarios that I see as contributors for “post-Lyme flares”.

  1. Mast Cell Activation Syndrome (MCAS) is a leading culprit for increased symptoms after Lyme treatment. Whether there is underlying primary MCAS or secondary MCAS triggered by the infection, mast cells often continue to be dysfunctional even after the infection is cleared. Mast Cell Targeted Therapy can be very helpful in stabilizing mast cells, minimizing mediator release and thereby minimizing inflammation.
  2. Another important possibility to consider when patients have flares of symptoms after treatment for Lyme, is the presence of “co-infections.” Treating Lyme can make room for other infections to reactivate, like viruses (EBV, HHV-6, etc), Babesia, Bartonella, and many other microbes. It is important to look for other infections while treating Lyme, so as to not miss the need for other types of treatment.
  3. Persister Lyme is a major cause of  “Post-Lyme flares.” The bacteria that causes Lyme, Borrelia Burgdorferi, can exist in a slow-growing, persister form that is resistant to antibiotics and other anti-microbial treatment. Even aggressive treatment for Lyme disease can leave behind these persister organisms that can continue to wreak havoc on the body.
What are the best current treatment for “stubborn” Bartonella? -Deb T.

Bartonella is probably one of the most difficult chronic infections that I’ve had to treat in my practice. It is necessary to use a multi-pronged approach in treatment of Bartonella. Some patients have other co-infections, which complicates the treatment as well. While I don’t think there is a “best” treatment for Bartonella yet, in my practice what I have found helpful is a combination of modalities, which could include SOT therapy (Supportive Oligonucleotide Technique), Ozone therapy, Herbal protocols and/or Antibiotics, and other therapies.

GLA is currently fundraising for The Bartonella Discovery Program, a research project bringing together some of the top researchers world-wide who are experts on Bartonellosis. These researchers will learn more about the bacteria and which treatments are most likely to cure patients.

How do you heal the nervous system after neurological Lyme and Bartonella ravage it? -Katie M.

Healing the nervous system after Lyme, Bartonella or other infections is a complicated process.  Reducing inflammation, not just by treating the infections, but also by targeting the immune cells that can continue to cause inflammation, is key. We have a considerable amount of evidence that mast cells in the central nervous system are in constant communication with other immune cells like astrocytes and microglial cells and together can be a major driver of neuroinflammation. There is no cure for neuroinflammation but there are a vast number of drugs and natural treatments that have been studied and some show promise in reducing the neuroinflammatory process. Some strategies include mast cell targeted therapy, treatment with natural compounds such as proresolving mediators (SPMs), PEA (palmitoylethinolamide), resveratrol, turmeric, and others, and various drugs like low-dose naltrexone, minocycline, NSAIDS, and steroids. Treatment needs to be individualized and other confounding medical conditions should be taken into account when choosing a protocol against neuroinflammation.

The above material is provided for information purposes only. The material (a) is not nor should be considered, or used as a substitute for, medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment, nor (b) does it necessarily represent endorsement by or an official position of Global Lyme Alliance, Inc. or any of its directors, officers, advisors or volunteers. Advice on the testing, treatment or care of an individual patient should be obtained through consultation with a physician who has examined that patient or is familiar with that patient’s medical history.
GLA Contributor

Dr. Tania Dempsey

GLA Contributor

*Opinions expressed by contributors are their own. Dr. Tania Dempsey is an expert in chronic disease, autoimmune disorders and mast cell activation syndrome. She received her MD from The Johns Hopkins University School of Medicine and her BS degree from Cornell University. Dr. Dempsey completed her Residency at NYU Medical Center/ Bellevue Hospital. She is Board Certified in Internal Medicine and a Diplomate of the American Board of Integrative and Holistic Medicine. Dr. Dempsey opened the AIM Center for Personalized Medicine, where she currently practices.

Email: info@aimcenterpm.com

For more:

Category:

Activism, Babesia, Bartonella, Lyme, Mast Cell Activation Syndrome (MCAS), Treatment, Viruses

Pfizer Asks Court to Dismiss Whistleblower Lawsuit Because Government Was Aware of Fraud

https://childrenshealthdefense.org/defender/pfizer-whistleblower-lawsuit-fraud/

Pfizer Asks Court to Dismiss Whistleblower Lawsuit Because Government Was Aware of Fraud

In an interview with The Defender, the lawyer representing whistleblower Brook Jackson said Pfizer is arguing the court should dismiss Jackson’s lawsuit alleging fraud in Pfizer’s COVID-19 clinical trials because the U.S. government knew about the wrongdoings but continued to do business with the vaccine maker.

Pfizer Asks Court to Dismiss Whistleblower Lawsuit

A lawsuit filed by whistleblower Brook Jackson alleging Pfizer and two of its contractors manipulated data and committed other acts of fraud during Pfizer’s COVID-19 clinical trials is paused following a motion by the defendants to dismiss the case.

In an interview with The Defender, Jackson’s lawyer said Pfizer argued the lawsuit, which was filed under the False Claims Act, should be dismissed because the U.S. government knew of the wrongdoings in the clinical trials but continued to do business with the vaccine maker.

Under the False Claims Act, whistleblowers can be rewarded for confidentially disclosing fraud that results in a financial loss to the federal government.

However, a 2016 U.S. Supreme Court decision that expanded the scope of a legal principle known as “materiality” resulted in a series of federal court decisions in which fraud cases brought under the False Claims Act were dismissed.

As interpreted by the Supreme Court, if the government continued paying a contractor despite the contractor’s fraudulent activity, the fraud was not considered “material” to the contract.

Pfizer is a federal contractor because it signed multiple contracts with the U.S. government to provide COVID-19 vaccines and Paxlovid, a pill used to treat the virus.

“Pfizer claims they can get away with fraud as long as the government would write them a check despite knowing about the fraud,” attorney Robert Barnes said.

The other two defendants in the case are Ventavia Research Group, which conducted vaccine trials on behalf of Pfizer, and ICON PLC, also a Pfizer contractor.

In an attempt to strengthen the False Claims Act’s anti-retaliation provisions and install new safeguards against industry-level blacklisting of whistleblowers seeking employment, Congress in July 2021 introduced the False Claims Amendments Act of 2021.

In December 2021, Pfizer hired a well-connected lobbyist, Hazen Marshall, and the law firm Williams & Jensen to lobby against the bill.

Pfizer previously was heavily fined in connection with the False Claims Act. As part of a 2009 settlement, the company paid $2.3 billion in fines — the largest healthcare fraud settlement in the history of the U.S. Department of Justice — stemming from allegations of illegal marketing of off-label products not approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

“Pfizer, one of the most criminally fined drug companies in the world, wants to weaken the laws that hold them accountable,” Barnes told The Defender.

Congress has taken no action on the False Claims Amendments Act since November 2021, when the bill was added to the Senate’s legislative calendar.

Barnes said the outcome of Jackson’s case against Pfizer is significant not just for his client, but also for the American public.

“This case will determine if Big Pharma can rip off the American people using a dangerous drug that harms millions without any legal remedy because they claim the government was in on the scam.”

Jackson was a regional director for Ventavia for a brief period in 2020 but was fired after she notified the FDA about issues with Pfizer’s vaccine trials.

After she was fired, she gave The BMJ a cache of internal company documents, photos and recordings highlighting the alleged wrongdoing by Ventavia.

The documents she provided contained evidence of falsified data, blind trial failures and awareness on the part of at least one Ventavia executive that members of the company’s staff were “falsifying data.”

Jackson’s documents also provided evidence of administrators who had “no training” or medical certifications, or who provided “very little oversight” during the trials.

Jackson filed her complaint in August 2021, in the U.S. District Court, Eastern District of Texas, Beaumont Division, alleging Pfizer, Ventavia and ICON “deliberately withheld crucial information from the United States that calls the safety and efficacy of their vaccine into question.”

A district court judge in February unsealed Jackson’s complaint, which included 400 pages of exhibits.

According to the complaint, Jackson, who had more than 15 years of experience working with clinical trials, “repeatedly informed her superiors of poor laboratory management, patient safety concerns and data integrity issues” during the approximately two weeks she was employed by Ventavia.

“Brook [Jackson] brought a Qui Tam action and a retaliatory discharge case against Pfizer and others for fraud on the people concerning Pfizer’s false certifications to the U.S. Department of Defense about the safety and efficacy of their COVID-19 vaccine,” Barnes said.

A Qui Tam case refers to a provision under the False Claims Act that allows individuals and entities with evidence of fraud against federal programs or contracts to sue the wrongdoer on behalf of the U.S. government.

“She was part of the clinical trials, witnessed extraordinary malfeasance, blew the whistle, and was quickly fired after she blew the whistle.”

Barnes said his legal team will in August file its opposition brief to Pfizer’s motion to dismiss, and the judge may rule on the motion to dismiss by fall 2022.

__________________
For more:

Category:

Activism, vaccines, Viruses

Call For An Independent Inquiry Into the Origin of the SARS-CoV-2 Virus

**UPDATE July 2022**

For two years the WHO & Tedros claimed COVID was from a natural origin.  He has now done an about face and  PUBLICLY declared it was premature to rule out a lab leak.

He is asking China for full information, which is akin to asking the moon for cheese, according to a law professor, expert in public health law, and director of a WHO Collaborating Center on Public Health Law and Human Rights.

__________________

According to a “senior European politician,” World Health Organization Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus confided to him in private that he believes COVID-19 was the result of a catastrophic accident at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan, China.

But that’s not what the highly compromised WHO scientific advisory group concluded in 2020.  After sharp criticism, the WHO set up another advisory group called SAGO, which released its preliminary report June 9, 2022 – which also found the lab leak theory to be unlikely despite the fact none of the three pieces of data that would support zoonotic origin have been identified.

SARS-CoV-2 has several mechanisms for targeting HERV-K102, a human replication-competent endogenous retrovirus that protects against viruses and is a crucial defense mechanism against severe COVID-19.  This fact strongly supports a lab-leak hypothesis as the virus appears to have been designed to bypass this defense mechanism as selection of this trait could not have occurred in animals as only humans have HERV-K102 and the only way to give a bat-related coronavirus the ability to inhibit this mechanism is by passaging the virus through humanized mice, which has been done.  Source

http://  Approx. 17 Min

June 11, 2022

Dr. John Campbell on the Latest Lab-Leak Report

“I don’t know whether to laugh or cry.” ~ Dr. Campbell

Me either.

____________________

https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2202769119

A call for an independent inquiry into the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus

Neil L. Harrison nh2298@columbia.edu and Jeffrey D. Sachs sachs@ei.columbia.eduAuthors Info & Affiliations
May 19, 2022
119 (21) e2202769119
https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2202769119
Since the identification of theSARS-CoV-2 in Wuhan, China, in January 2020 (1), the origin of the virus has been a topic of intense scientific debate and public speculation. The two main hypotheses are that the virus emerged from human exposure to an infected animal [“zoonosis” (2)] or that it emerged in a research-related incident (3). The investigation into the origin of the virus has been made difficult by the lack of key evidence from the earliest days of the outbreak—there’s no doubt that greater transparency on the part of Chinese authorities would be enormously helpful. Nevertheless, we argue here that there is much important information that can be gleaned from US-based research institutions, information not yet made available for independent, transparent, and scientific scrutiny.
When it comes to deciphering the origins of COVID-19, much important information can be gleaned from US-based research institutions—information that has yet to be made available for independent, transparent, and scientific scrutiny. Image credit: Dave Cutler (artist).
The data available within the United States would explicitly include, but are not limited to, viral sequences gathered and held as part of the PREDICT project and other funded programs, as well as sequencing data and laboratory notebooks from US laboratories. We call on US government scientific agencies, most notably the NIH, to support a full, independent, and transparent investigation of the origins of SARS-CoV-2. This should take place, for example, within a tightly focused science-based bipartisan Congressional inquiry with full investigative powers, which would be able to ask important questions—but avoid misguided witch-hunts governed more by politics than by science.

Essential US Investigations

The US intelligence community (IC) was tasked, in 2021 by President Joe Biden (4), with investigating the origin of the virus. In their summary public statement, the IC writes that “all agencies assess that two hypotheses are plausible: natural exposure to an infected animal and a laboratory-associated incident” (4). The IC further writes that “China’s cooperation most likely would be needed to reach a conclusive assessment of the origins of COVID-19 [coronavirus disease 2019].” Of course, such cooperation is highly warranted and should be pursued by the US Government and the US scientific community. Yet, as outlined below, much could be learned by investigating US-supported and US-based work that was underway in collaboration with Wuhan-based institutions, including the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), China. It is still not clear whether the IC investigated these US-supported and US-based activities. If it did, it has yet to make any of its findings available to the US scientific community for independent and transparent analysis and assessment. If, on the other hand, the IC did not investigate these US-supported and US-based activities, then it has fallen far short of conducting a comprehensive investigation.
This lack of an independent and transparent US-based scientific investigation has had four highly adverse consequences. First, public trust in the ability of US scientific institutions to govern the activities of US science in a responsible manner has been shaken. Second, the investigation of the origin of SARS-CoV-2 has become politicized within the US Congress (5); as a result, the inception of an independent and transparent investigation has been obstructed and delayed. Third, US researchers with deep knowledge of the possibilities of a laboratory-associated incident have not been enabled to share their expertise effectively. Fourth, the failure of NIH, one of the main funders of the US–China collaborative work, to facilitate the investigation into the origins of SARS-CoV-2 (4) has fostered distrust regarding US biodefense research activities.
Much of the work on SARS-like CoVs performed in Wuhan was part of an active and highly collaborative US–China scientific research program funded by the US Government (NIH, Defense Threat Reduction Agency [DTRA], and US Agency for International Development [USAID]), coordinated by researchers at EcoHealth Alliance (EHA), but involving researchers at several other US institutions. For this reason, it is important that US institutions be transparent about any knowledge of the detailed activities that were underway in Wuhan and in the United States. The evidence may also suggest that research institutions in other countries were involved, and those too should be asked to submit relevant information (e.g., with respect to unpublished sequences).
Participating US institutions include the EHA, the University of North Carolina (UNC), the University of California at Davis (UCD), the NIH, and the USAID. Under a series of NIH grants and USAID contracts, EHA coordinated the collection of SARS-like bat CoVs from the field in southwest China and southeast Asia, the sequencing of these viruses, the archiving of these sequences (involving UCD), and the analysis and manipulation of these viruses (notably at UNC). A broad spectrum of coronavirus research work was done not only in Wuhan (including groups at Wuhan University and the Wuhan CDC, as well as WIV) but also in the United States. The exact details of the fieldwork and laboratory work of the EHA-WIV-UNC partnership, and the engagement of other institutions in the United States and China, has not been disclosed for independent analysis. The precise nature of the experiments that were conducted, including the full array of viruses collected from the field and the subsequent sequencing and manipulation of those viruses, remains unknown.
EHA, UNC, NIH, USAID, and other research partners have failed to disclose their activities to the US scientific community and the US public, instead declaring that they were not involved in any experiments that could have resulted in the emergence of SARS-CoV-2. The NIH has specifically stated (6) that there is a significant evolutionary distance between the published viral sequences and that of SARS-CoV-2 and that the pandemic virus could not have resulted from the work sponsored by NIH. Of course, this statement is only as good as the limited data on which it is based, and verification of this claim is dependent on gaining access to any other unpublished viral sequences that are deposited in relevant US and Chinese databases (7,8). On May 11, 2022, Acting NIH Director Lawrence Tabak testified before Congress that several such sequences in a US database were removed from public view, and that this was done at the request of both Chinese and US investigators.
Blanket denials from the NIH are no longer good enough. Although the NIH and USAID have strenuously resisted full disclosure of the details of the EHA-WIV-UNC work program, several documents leaked to the public or released through the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) have raised concerns. These research proposals make clear that the EHA-WIV-UNC collaboration was involved in the collection of a large number of so-far undocumented SARS-like viruses and was engaged in their manipulation within biological safety level (BSL)-2 and BSL-3 laboratory facilities, raising concerns that an airborne virus might have infected a laboratory worker (9). A variety of scenarios have been discussed by others, including an infection that involved a natural virus collected from the field or perhaps an engineered virus manipulated in one of the laboratories (3).

Overlooked Details

Special concerns surround the presence of an unusual furin cleavage site (FCS) in SARS-CoV-2 (10) that augments the pathogenicity and transmissibility of the virus relative to related viruses like SARS-CoV-1 (11, 12). SARS-CoV-2 is, to date, the only identified member of the subgenus sarbecovirus that contains an FCS, although these are present in other coronaviruses (13, 14). A portion of the sequence of the spike protein of some of these viruses is illustrated in the alignment shown in Fig. 1, illustrating the unusual nature of the FCS and its apparent insertion in SARS-CoV-2 (15). From the first weeks after the genome sequence of SARS-CoV-2 became available, researchers have commented on the unexpected presence of the FCS within SARS-CoV-2—the implication being that SARS-CoV-2 might be a product of laboratory manipulation. In a review piece arguing against this possibility, it was asserted that the amino acid sequence of the FCS in SARS-CoV-2 is an unusual, nonstandard sequence for an FCS and that nobody in a laboratory would design such a novel FCS (13).
Fig. 1.
This alignment of the amino acid sequences of coronavirus spike proteins, in the region of the S1/S2 junction, illustrates the sequence of SARS-CoV-2 (Wuhan-Hu-1) and some of its closest relatives. The furin cleavage site (FCS) is indicated (PRRAR’SVAS), and furin cuts the spike protein between R and S, as indicated by the red arrowhead. Adapted from Chan & Zhan (15).
In fact, the assertion that the FCS in SARS-CoV-2 has an unusual, nonstandard amino acid sequence is false. The amino acid sequence of the FCS in SARS-CoV-2 also exists in the human ENaC α subunit (16), where it is known to be functional and has been extensively studied (17, 18). The FCS of human ENaC α has the amino acid sequence RRAR’SVAS (Fig. 2), an eight–amino-acid sequence that is perfectly identical with the FCS of SARS-CoV-2 (16). ENaC is an epithelial sodium channel, expressed on the apical surface of epithelial cells in the kidney, colon, and airways (19, 20), that plays a critical role in controlling fluid exchange. The ENaC α subunit has a functional FCS (17, 18) that is essential for ion channel function (19) and has been characterized in a variety of species. The FCS sequence of human ENaC α (20) is identical in chimpanzee, bonobo, orangutan, and gorilla (SI Appendix, Fig. 1), but diverges in all other species, even primates, except one. (The one non-human non-great ape species with the same sequence is Pipistrellus kuhlii, a bat species found in Europe and Western Asia; other bat species, including Rhinolophus ferrumequinem, have a different FCS sequence in ENaC α [RKAR‘SAAS]).
Fig. 2.
Amino acid alignment of the furin cleavage sites of SARS-CoV-2 spike protein with (Top) the spike proteins of other viruses that lack the furin cleavage site and (Bottom) the furin cleavage sites present in the α subunits of human and mouse ENaC. Adapted from Anand et al. (16).
One consequence of this “molecular mimicry” between the FCS of SARS CoV-2 spike and the FCS of human ENaC is competition for host furin in the lumen of the Golgi apparatus, where the SARS-CoV-2 spike is processed. This results in a decrease in human ENaC expression (21). A decrease in human ENaC expression compromises airway function and has been implicated as a contributing factor in the pathogenesis of COVID-19 (22). Another consequence of this astonishing molecular mimicry is evidenced by apparent cross-reactivity with human ENaC of antibodies from COVID-19 patients, with the highest levels of cross-reacting antibodies directed against this epitope being associated with most severe disease (23).
We do not know whether the insertion of the FCS was the result of natural evolution (2, 13)—perhaps via a recombination event in an intermediate mammal or a human (13, 24)—or was the result of a deliberate introduction of the FCS into a SARS-like virus as part of a laboratory experiment. We do know that the insertion of such FCS sequences into SARS-like viruses was a specific goal of work proposed by the EHA-WIV-UNC partnership within a 2018 grant proposal (“DEFUSE”) that was submitted to the US Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) (25). The 2018 proposal to DARPA was not funded, but we do not know whether some of the proposed work was subsequently carried out in 2018 or 2019, perhaps using another source of funding.
We also know that that this research team would be familiar with several previous experiments involving the successful insertion of an FCS sequence into SARS-CoV-1 (26) and other coronaviruses, and they had a lot of experience in construction of chimeric SARS-like viruses (27–29). In addition, the research team would also have some familiarity with the FCS sequence and the FCS-dependent activation mechanism of human ENaC α (19), which was extensively characterized at UNC (17, 18). For a research team assessing the pandemic potential of SARS-related coronaviruses, the FCS of human ENaC—an FCS known to be efficiently cleaved by host furin present in the target location (epithelial cells) of an important target organ (lung), of the target organism (human)—might be a rational, if not obvious, choice of FCS to introduce into a virus to alter its infectivity, in line with other work performed previously.
Of course, the molecular mimicry of ENaC within the SARS-CoV-2 spike protein might be a mere coincidence, although one with a very low probability. The exact FCS sequence present in SARS-CoV-2 has recently been introduced into the spike protein of SARS-CoV-1 in the laboratory, in an elegant series of experiments (12, 30), with predictable consequences in terms of enhanced viral transmissibility and pathogenicity. Obviously, the creation of such SARS-1/2 “chimeras” is an area of some concern for those responsible for present and future regulation of this area of biology. [Note that these experiments in ref. 30 were done in the context of a safe “pseudotyped” virus and thus posed no danger of producing or releasing a novel pathogen.] These simple experiments show that the introduction of the 12 nucleotides that constitute the FCS insertion in SARS-CoV-2 would not be difficult to achieve in a lab. It would therefore seem reasonable to ask that electronic communications and other relevant data from US groups should be made available for scrutiny.

Seeking Transparency

To date, the federal government, including the NIH, has not done enough to promote public trust and transparency in the science surrounding SARS-CoV-2. A steady trickle of disquieting information has cast a darkening cloud over the agency. The NIH could say more about the possible role of its grantees in the emergence of SARS-CoV-2, yet the agency has failed to reveal to the public the possibility that SARS-CoV-2 emerged from a research-associated event, even though several researchers raised that concern on February 1, 2020, in a phone conversation that was documented by email (5). Those emails were released to the public only through FOIA, and they suggest that the NIH leadership took an early and active role in promoting the “zoonotic hypothesis” and the rejection of the laboratory-associated hypothesis (5). The NIH has resisted the release of important evidence, such as the grant proposals and project reports of EHA, and has continued to redact materials released under FOIA, including a remarkable 290-page redaction in a recent FOIA release.
Information now held by the research team headed by EHA (7), as well as the communications of that research team with US research funding agencies, including NIH, USAID, DARPA, DTRA, and the Department of Homeland Security, could shed considerable light on the experiments undertaken by the US-funded research team and on the possible relationship, if any, between those experiments and the emergence of SARS-CoV-2. We do not assert that laboratory manipulation was involved in the emergence of SARS-CoV-2, although it is apparent that it could have been. However, we do assert that there has been no independent and transparent scientific scrutiny to date of the full scope of the US-based evidence.
The relevant US-based evidence would include the following information: laboratory notebooks, virus databases, electronic media (emails, other communications), biological samples, viral sequences gathered and held as part of the PREDICT project (7) and other funded programs, and interviews of the EHA-led research team by independent researchers, together with a full record of US agency involvement in funding the research on SARS-like viruses, especially with regard to projects in collaboration with Wuhan-based institutions. We suggest that a bipartisan inquiry should also follow up on the tentative conclusion of the IC (4) that the initial outbreak in Wuhan may have occurred no later than November 2019 and that therefore the virus was circulating before the cluster of known clinical cases in December. The IC did not reveal the evidence for this statement, nor when parts of the US Government or US-based researchers first became aware of a potential new outbreak. Any available information and knowledge of the earliest days of the outbreak, including viral sequences (8), could shed considerable light on the origins question.
We continue to recognize the tremendous value of US–China cooperation in ongoing efforts to uncover the proximal origins of the pandemic. Much vital information still resides in China, in the laboratories, hospital samples, and early epidemiological information not yet available to the scientific community. Yet a US-based investigation need not wait—there is much to learn from the US institutions that were extensively involved in research that may have contributed to, or documented the emergence of, the SARS-CoV-2 virus. Only an independent and transparent investigation, perhaps as a bipartisan Congressional inquiry, will reveal the information that is needed to enable a thorough scientific process of scrutiny and evaluation.

Supporting Information

Appendix 01 (PDF)

References

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research, Viruses