Coronavirus: Wuhan virology lab’s long history of scientific collaboration
- French and US expertise behind establishment of China’s top-level research facility into deadly and easily transmittable pathogens
- International scientists defend Wuhan Institute of Virology and its deputy director Shi Zhengli who discovered link between bats and Sars
While experts have repeatedly said it is highly unlikely the new coronavirus – named Sars-CoV-2 – accidentally leaked from the lab, its location in the central Chinese city where the first infections were reported has made the institute a target in the blame game between the US and China over the pandemic.
But, from the outset, international scientists were closely involved in the development of the institute’s highly specialised laboratory and have repeatedly vouched for its safety procedures. In addition, the institute’s researchers have collaborated with their global counterparts for years.
James Le Duc, director of the Galveston National Laboratory at the University of Texas, one of the largest active biocontainment facilities on a US campus, was closely involved in training the Wuhan institute’s staff from before it opened in January 2018.
“She is the research scientist who discovered the link between bats and the original Sars virus that caused disease worldwide in 2003. She has participated in each of our dialogues; in every session, she has been fully engaged, very open and transparent about her work, and eager to collaborate,” he said.
Le Duc said evidence showed the new virus was not the result of intentional genetic engineering and that it almost certainly originated from nature, given its high similarity to other known bat-associated coronaviruses. He also affirmed that the lab “is of comparable quality and safety measures as any currently in operation in the US or Europe”.
Peter Daszak, president of the New York-based non-profit EcoHealth Alliance, who has been involved in research on bat coronaviruses in China and Southeast Asia for 15 years, has been vocal on Twitter about the campaign to discredit the institute and Shi.
In a tweet last week, Daszak said Shi had been insulted and threatened by conspiracy theorists in the US and China. “World-class virologist, first to identify the origin of Sars-CoV-2 and wonderful generous person. She should be lauded as a hero, not vilified.”
The Wuhan institute opened in 1956 as a microbiology facility, with an emphasis on agriculture. It was set up by the Chinese Academy of Sciences, Wuhan University and Central China Agricultural University to study soil quality and the pathogens affecting plants and animals, according to a report at the time by state news agency Xinhua. The project was overseen by Gao Shangyin, a Chinese scientist who received his doctorate from Yale.
Over the years the institute expanded its research to include human infectious diseases but it was the outbreak of severe acute respiratory syndrome, or Sars, 17 years ago that alerted China to the need for a laboratory capable of conducting research into the deadly and highly transmittable group of pathogens known as P4.
According to a report in scientific newspaper China Science Daily to mark the new laboratory’s opening in January 2018, the institute’s then-director Hu Zhihong received a call in February 2003 from the former vice-chairman of the Chinese Academy of Sciences Chen Zhu, asking her to oversee the building of a P4 lab.
China looked to France to overcome the lack of local expertise and the two countries signed an agreement in 2004 to build the 300 million yuan (US$42.4 million) lab in Wuhan. It was modelled on the P4 Jean Mérieux-Inserm Laboratory in Lyon, where the Ebola virus was first confirmed and characterised in 2014.
Le Duc’s Galveston laboratory provided short-term training to staff from the Wuhan institute in 2013 and also hosted two postdoctoral scientists from the facility, who completed the almost year-long training needed to gain independent access to facilities rated at BSL-4 – the highest level of bioresearch safety.
“Both have since returned to [the institute] in China, where they were instrumental in establishing their biosafety and biosecurity training programme for the new BSL-4 laboratory and where they continue their independent research in the new facility,” Le Duc said. “Our faculty and staff maintain contact and continue to collaborate scientifically with these two scientists.”
Safety requirements for the P4 lab are stringent, requiring researchers to wear positive-pressure suits and work continuously in shifts of four to six hours, without bathroom or meal breaks. According to an article about safety on the institute’s website last year, they must also change their clothes and undergo a chemical disinfection procedure which takes half an hour on both entering and leaving the facility.
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“Because the P4 lab researches highly pathogenic microorganisms, inside the lab, once the virus test tubes have been opened, it’s like opening Pandora’s box,” the notice said. “These viruses can come and go without a trace, and while there are various protective measures, it still requires that the researcher operates carefully to avoid risks from operational errors.”
Song Donglin, the lab project’s head, told Guangzhou Daily in 2018 that the work to make the lab fit to handle dangerous pathogens had included installation of a sewage treatment and life support system on the ground floor of its main building.
The core laboratories, as well as filter and pipeline systems, are housed on the second and third floors while the top level is devoted to an air conditioning system.
