We Built a Chimeric Virus Encoding a Novel, Zoonotic CoV Spike Protein

I'm not a virologist and don't pretend to be. But I can read a fugging manual with the best of them, and understand what I've read. That said, slowly reread the nature paper from 2015 yourself. 

Therefore, to examine the emergence potential (that is, the potential to infect humans) of circulating bat CoVs, we built a chimeric virus encoding a novel, zoonotic CoV spike protein—from the RsSHC014-CoV sequence that was isolated from Chinese horseshoe bats¹—in the context of the SARS-CoV mouse-adapted backbone. The hybrid virus allowed us to evaluate the ability of the novel spike protein to cause disease independently of other necessary adaptive mutations in its natural backbone. Using this approach, we characterized CoV infection mediated by the SHC014 spike protein in primary human airway cells and in vivo, and tested the efficacy of available immune therapeutics against SHC014-CoV. Together, the strategy translates metagenomics data to help predict and prepare for future emergent viruses.

Shi Zhengli - you know you done f'd up...., 

Mebbe what I'm watching from other "gain of function" virologists is a poster-child instance of the Weinstein's Distributed Information Suppression Complex?

The Proximal Origin of SARS-C0V2

virological |   Since the first reports of a novel pneumonia (COVID-19) in Wuhan city, Hubei province, China there has been considerable discussion and uncertainty over the origin of the causative virus, SARS-CoV-2. Infections with SARS-CoV-2 are now widespread in China, with cases in every province. As of 14 February 2020, 64,473 such cases have been confirmed, with 1,384 deaths attributed to the virus. These official case numbers are likely an underestimate because of limited reporting of mild and asymptomatic cases, and the virus is clearly capable of efficient human-to-human transmission. Based on the possibility of spread to countries with weaker healthcare systems, the World Health Organization has declared the COVID-19 outbreak a Public Health Emergency of International Concern (PHEIC). There are currently neither vaccines nor specific treatments for this disease.

SARS-CoV-2 is the seventh member of the Coronaviridae known to infect humans. Three of these viruses, SARS CoV-1, MERS, and SARS-CoV-2, can cause severe disease; four, HKU1, NL63, OC43 and 229E, are associated with mild respiratory symptoms. Herein, we review what can be deduced about the origin and early evolution of SARS-CoV-2 from the comparative analysis of available genome sequence data. In particular, we offer a perspective on the notable features in the SARS-CoV-2 genome and discuss scenarios by which these features could have arisen. Importantly, this analysis provides evidence that SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct nor a purposefully manipulated virus.

Say What?

The genomic comparison of both alpha- and betacoronaviruses (family Coronaviridae ) described below identifies two notable features of the SARS-CoV-2 genome: (i) based on structural modelling and early biochemical experiments, SARS-CoV-2 appears to be optimized for binding to the human ACE2 receptor; (ii) the highly variable spike (S) protein of SARS-CoV-2 has a polybasic (furin) cleavage site at the S1 and S2 boundary via the insertion of twelve nucleotides. Additionally, this event led to the acquisition of three predicted O-linked glycans around the polybasic cleavage site.

Almost Like It Was Optimized to Clip Tards...., (sarc)

In Daegu, 1900 Shincheonji Church members have been tested for coronavirus.

1300 had symptoms & 600 did not.

Among those 1300 with symptoms, 87.5% were confirmed with the virus .

BUT out of the 600 WITHOUT symptoms, 70% were confirmed with coronavirus.

— Laura Bicker (@BBCLBicker) February 29, 2020

Put another way:

Out of a population of 1,900
1,300 were symptomatic
600 asymptomatic

420 tested positive but asymptomatic
1,131 tested positive and symptomatic

= 1,551 infections out of 1,900 = 81%

— Jay Reynolds (@jaycreynolds) February 29, 2020

Insane attack rate

Where is this thing from

— Ani in the coronapocalypse🇨🇦🏳️‍🌈 (@anabellebf) February 29, 2020

What a Difference a Death Day Makes...., (Community Spread/No Known Travel)

FoxNews |  "Yes, we are thinking about [the] southern border, we have received a lot of power on the southern border over the last couple of years from the courts but we are looking at that very strongly," Trump said at the press conference.

The rare appearance in the White House press briefing room came shortly after news of the first death in the United States from the new virus and a terrible week on the stock market over fears of the outbreak.

"There's no reason to panic at all. This is something that is being handled professionally," Trump assured, while also acknowledging more cases in the U.S. are "likely."

The president said there are 22 patients in the United States who have coronavirus.

"Unfortunately, one person passed away overnight," Trump said, speaking to a case in Washington state.

“She was a wonderful woman, a medically high-risk patient in her late 50s. Four others are very ill. Thankfully 15 are either recovered fully or they're well on their way to recovery. And in all cases, they've been let go in their home.”

Shortly before Trump spoke, Washington state health officials confirmed one person had died from the new virus; the first person to die from the disease in the United States. She was not infected by travel abroad, officials said.

Trump also said Saturday that most healthy people would be able to pull through should they contract coronavirus: "Additional cases in the United States are likely. But healthy individuals should be able to fully recover.”

Not Good When The Peasants Realize They're Being Bent-Over

newyork.cbslocal |  With the coronavirus outbreak affecting at least 40 countries, many travelers are concerned about what’s being done to contain the virus. At JFK Airport, jetlagged passengers typically in a rush to clear immigration are now appalled by a lack of screening, especially compared to procedures in the countries they just left.

Emily Ferrara and Blair Haworth just returned from Florence, Italy, where their study abroad program was canceled because of the virus. There are more than 300 cases there, one of the largest outbreaks outside China.

Yet, the students told CBS2’s Christina Fan they weren’t asked a single question about potential symptoms once they landed in New York City.

“We didn’t even get checked. Like we’re used to being in Florence where you get your temperature checked. Here they didn’t do anything, which is kind of crazy,” Ferrara said. “Considering, like, how much the cases have spread so fast, like, they should definitely be taking more precautions here.”

Currently, the United States is only conducting health screenings for passengers who are flying in from China.

Some, including Mayor Bill de Blasio this week, called for the screenings to be extended to flights from Italy, South Korea and Japan.

But Dr. Teresa Amato, the chair of emergency medicine at Long Island Jewish Forest Hills, says the idea may not be effective. 

“I think it’s becoming increasingly difficult given that people are infected with no symptoms and travel areas are becoming more and more widespread with the virus,” she said.

In addition to airport screenings, some passengers believe there should be more travel restrictions from countries other than China. President Donald Trump weighed in on the idea at a press conference Wednesday.

“At a right time, we might do that. Right now, it’s not the right time,” he said.

Remember This Peasants: Your Government Valued Somebody Else's Revenues/Profits Over Your Safety

SMH |  Was Australia about to put the cash flow of its universities ahead of the peoples' health in the middle of a pandemic? Was the Morrison government about to bungle the coronavirus response as badly as it did the bushfires?

As MPs and senators returned to Canberra this week for a parliamentary sitting, it was a topic of lively concern. Government members knew that the universities had been agitating behind the scenes for the China travel ban to be relaxed as soon as possible. Some 100,000 of their Chinese students are caught by the ban and the unis want them back in Australia. Paying fees.

The Chinese government had been complaining about the ban for weeks, too. Australia had been "discriminatory", according to the Chinese embassy in Canberra. In multiple meetings across the government, every week with the politicians who have let them in, China's officials have been pressing their case hard.

The travel ban was decided immediately after the US made the same call. Beijing instantly lashed both the US and Australia on that occasion – the Chinese Communist Party's official mouthpiece, People's Daily, calling it "racist".

But, of course, that decision now looks very wise, more so with each passing day. The WHO followed suit 10 days later. When Morrison announced the China travel ban four weeks ago, there were about 7000 infections disclosed by Beijing.

By Thursday this week that number had ballooned to 78,000. The number of countries announcing travel bans has grown proportionately, and mostly they have acted too late.

The political capture of the WHO means, in effect, that it's every country for itself. It also underlines the central importance of keeping politics and other extraneous pressures out of the decision-making processes on a medical matter. Likewise, China's early political cover-ups and bungling wasted precious weeks in containing the virus.

The Australian system for dealing with communicable diseases is less prone to politics. Morrison hid from the bushfires; he had no such option on the coronavirus. The Chief Medical Officer, Murphy, does not need the government's permission to invoke the Biosecurity Act. He informed Health Minister Greg Hunt on January 20 that he was triggering the act, automatically setting in train a pre-ordained process of monitoring and advice.

CCP General Chi Haotian Got Nothing on Sir Winston Churchill

greatgameindia |  For those who may not know, The Integrity Initiative is an anti-Russian propaganda outfit funded to the tune of $140 million by the British Foreign office. Throughout 2019, leaks have been released featuring documents dated to the early period of Trump’s election, demonstrating that this organization, already active across Europe promoting anti-Russian PR and smearing nationalist leaders such as Jeremy Corbyn, was intent on spreading deeply into the State Department and setting up “clusters” of anti-Trump operatives. The documents reveal high level meetings that Integrity Initiative Director Chris Donnelly had with former Trump Advisor Sebastien Gorka, McCain Foundation director Kurt Volker, Pentagon PR guru John Rendon among many others.

The exposure of the British hand behind the scenes affords us a unique glimpse into the real historical forces undermining America’s true constitutional tradition throughout the 20^th century, as Mueller/the Five Eyes/Integrity Initiative are not new phenomena but actually follow a modus operandi set down for already more than a century. One of the biggest obstacles to seeing this modus operandi run by the British Empire is located in the belief in a mythology which has become embedded in the global psyche for over half a century and which we should do our best to free ourselves of.

Myth of the “American Empire

While there has been a long-standing narrative promoted for over 70 years that the British Empire disappeared after World War II having been replaced by the “American Empire”, it is the furthest thing from the truth. America, as constitutionally represented by its greatest presidents (who can unfortunately be identified by their early deaths while serving in office), were never colonialist and were always in favor of reining in British Institutions at home while fighting British colonial thinking abroad.

Franklin Roosevelt’s thirteen year-long battle with the Deep State, which he referred to as the “economic royalists who should have left America in 1776″, was defined in clear terms by his patriotic Vice-President Henry Wallace who warned of the emergence of a new Anglo-American fascism in 1944 when he said:

“Fascism in the postwar inevitably will push steadily for Anglo-Saxon imperialism and eventually for war with Russia. Already American fascists are talking and writing about this conflict and using it as an excuse for their internal hatreds and intolerances toward certain races, creeds and classes.”

The fact is that already in 1944, a policy of Anglo-Saxon imperialism had been promoted subversively by British-run think tanks known as the Round Table Movement and Fabian Society, and the seeds had already been laid for the anti-Russian cold war by those British-run American fascists. It is not a coincidence that this fascist Cold War policy was announced in a March 5, 1946 speech in Fulton, Missouri by none other than Round Table-follower and the butcher of Bengal, Winston Churchill.

Something Stinks in Wuhan

nature |   "Therefore, to examine the emergence potential (that is, the potential to infect humans) of circulating bat CoVs, we built a chimeric virus encoding a novel, zoonotic CoV spike protein—from the RsSHC014-CoV sequence that was isolated from Chinese horseshoe bats1—in the context of the SARS-CoV mouse-adapted backbone. The hybrid virus allowed us to evaluate the ability of the novel spike protein to cause disease independently of other necessary adaptive mutations in its natural backbone. Using this approach, we characterized CoV infection mediated by the SHC014 spike protein in primary human airway cells and in vivo, and tested the efficacy of available immune therapeutics against SHC014-CoV"

So they create a "chimeric" SARS-CoV virus that can cause disease (in humans)?

They continue:

"we synthesized the SHC014 spike in the context of the replication-competent, mouse-adapted SARS-CoV backbone (we hereafter refer to the chimeric CoV as SHC014-MA15) to maximize the opportunity for pathogenesis and vaccine studies in mice (Supplementary Fig. 2a). Despite predictions from both structure-based modeling and pseudotyping experiments, SHC014-MA15 was viable and replicated to high titers in Vero cells"

So they "maximize the opportunity for pathogenesis". Very interesting...

And then they continue saying:

"To test the ability of the SHC014 spike to mediate infection of the human airway, we examined the sensitivity of the human epithelial airway cell line Calu-3 2B4 (ref. 9) to infection and found robust SHC014-MA15 replication, comparable to that of SARS-CoV Urbani (Fig. 1c). To extend these findings, primary human airway epithelial (HAE) cultures were infected and showed robust replication of both viruses"

So in the last paragraph they have found that the new chimeric virus they have created (they called it SHC014-MA15) "show robust replication" in human cells. A great success I guess...

But they continue with the research and say:

"We next analyzed infection in more susceptible, aged (12-month-old) animals. SARS-MA15–infected animals rapidly lost weight and succumbed to infection"

So they test the new chimeric virus (they call it SARS-MA15 and also SCH014-MA15) in mice and they saw a high pathogenicity in the lungs of the animals, more acute in older ones

Then they continue with the trials of the SHC014-MA15 chimeric virus:

"Similarly, antibodies 230.15 and 227.14, which were derived from memory B cells of SARS-CoV–infected patients13, also failed to block SHC014-MA15 replication (Fig. 2b,c). For all three antibodies, differences between the SARS and SHC014 spike amino acid sequences corresponded to direct or adjacent residue changes found in SARS-CoV escape mutants (fm6 N479R; 230.15 L443V; 227.14 K390Q/E), which probably explains the absence of the antibodies' neutralizing activity against SHC014. Finally, monoclonal antibody 109.8 was able to achieve 50% neutralization of SHC014-MA15, but only at high concentrations (10 μg/ml) (Fig. 2d). Together, the results demonstrate that broadly neutralizing antibodies against SARS-CoV may only have marginal efficacy against emergent SARS-like CoV strains such as SHC014."

So it seems that the new chimeric virus they created is quite resilient to the antibodies normally used to treat SARS

Still more about the risks of chimeric virus:

"the creation of chimeric viruses such as SHC014-MA15 was not expected to increase pathogenicity. Although SHC014-MA15 is attenuated relative to its parental mouse-adapted SARS-CoV, similar studies examining the pathogenicity of CoVs with the wild-type Urbani spike within the MA15 backbone showed no weight loss in mice and reduced viral replication23. Thus, relative to the Urbani spike–MA15 CoV, SHC014-MA15 shows a gain in pathogenesis (Fig. 1). On the basis of these findings, scientific review panels may deem similar studies building chimeric viruses based on circulating strains too risky to pursue, as increased pathogenicity in mammalian models cannot be excluded"

So they recognize they have created a very dangerous chimeric virus with a high pathogenesis, easily transmitted in human cells and hard to fight by antibodies, and they said at the end "building chimeric viruses based on circulating strains too risky to pursue, as increased pathegenicity in mammalian models cannot be excluded"

Say What?

At the end of the article they finally said:

"Coupled with restrictions on mouse-adapted strains and the development of monoclonal antibodies using escape mutants, research into CoV emergence and therapeutic efficacy may be severely limited moving forward. Together, these data and restrictions represent a crossroads of GOF research concerns; the potential to prepare for and mitigate future outbreaks must be weighed against the risk of creating more dangerous pathogens. In developing policies moving forward, it is important to consider the value of the data generated by these studies and whether these types of chimeric virus studies warrant further investigation versus the inherent risks involved "

So I have some questions:

a) What are the probabilities that an strange new SARS virus, never seen before, very easily transmitted and very pathogenic, started exactly some hundred meters from the same research lab where theses people were creating chimeric viruses one day and the following?

b) What are the probabilities that a new "wild" virus be so similar to this chimeric virus created in 2015 for this study? Could it be a self-fulfilling prophecy?

c) What are the probabilities that the Wuhan Virology Instute have developed a very accurate test for the brand "new" virus in just some days after the outbreak? Do they have some knowledge in advance of what kind of virus it was?

Conspiracy "Theories" Come From "Gain of Function" Facts

slate |  Responsible outlets have covered the conspiracy theories, attempting to debunk them. But even some experts don’t seem immune here. One rejected the idea of the virus being a biological weapon and praised the Wuhan Institute of Virology as a “world-class research institution that does world-class research” to the Washington Post at the end of January. Less than a month later, he was tweeting sympathetically about a New York Post opinion piece claiming the SARS-CoV-2 virus, the virus that causes COVID-19, had escaped from the same lab. 

These kinds of conspiracy theories thrive on our fear of the uncertain, on our tendency to demand absolute proof that something is not the case—and it’s difficult to prove something 100 percent false. Even scientists can get sucked into this: During the Ebola outbreak, a colleague and I tried to address concerns about ebolavirus “becoming airborne,” a theory based on the argument that because no one could prove it absolutely couldn’t happen, we should act as if it was happening.

South Korean Cults, Conservatives, and Coronavirus

FP |  South Korea initially seemed to have the COVID-19 epidemic under control, armed with efficient bureaucracy and state-of-the-art technology. However, since Feb. 18, the number of coronavirus cases in South Korea has exploded to more than 1,700 as of Thursday. The battle plan against the epidemic was derailed by the oldest of problems: religion and politics.

When it came to preparation, it helped that South Korea had one hell of a practice run: the MERS outbreak in 2015 that caused 38 deaths. At the time, the incompetent response by the conservative administration of then President Park Geun-hye put South Korea in the ignominious position of having the greatest number of cases outside of the Middle East. The fallout, which contributed to the public distrust of government that culminated in Park’s impeachment and removal, pushed the South Korean government to significantly revamp its preparation for the next viral event.

South Korea has been preparing for a potential new strain of coronavirus since as early as November 2019. Without knowing what virus would hit the country next, the Korea Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (KCDC) devised an ingenious method of testing for any type of coronavirus and eliminating known strains of coronavirus such as SARS or MERS to isolate the new variant of coronavirus.

For the first four weeks of the outbreak, South Korea marshaled high-tech resources to respond aggressively while promoting transparency. The government tracked the movements of travelers arriving from China, for example by tracking the use of credit cards, checking CCTV footage, or mandating they download an app to report their health status every day. For those infected, the government published an extremely detailed list of their whereabouts, down to which seat they sat in at a movie theater.

The info was also presented (with names removed) in an interactive website that allows the public to trace the movement of every single individual with coronavirus. To be sure, there were real privacy concerns—as when one unfortunate patient in Daejeon had news of their visit to a risqué lingerie store blasted to every smartphone in their city. Yet on balance, these disclosures did much to calm the nerves and prevent unnecessary panic in the population. By Feb. 17, South Korea’s tally of COVID-19 patients stood at 30, with zero deaths. Ten patients were fully cured and discharged, with some of the discharged patients declaring the disease was “not something as serious as one might think.” The government seemed ready to declare victory.

That all came to a crashing halt last week thanks to the 31st case. Patient No. 31, discovered on Feb. 18, was a member of a quasi-Christian cult called Shincheonji, one of the many new religious movements in the country. Founded in 1984, Shincheonji (whose official name is Shincheonji, Church of Jesus, the Temple of the Tabernacle of the Testimony) means “new heaven and earth,” a reference to the Book of Revelation. Its founder Lee Man-hee claims to be the second coming of Jesus who is to establish the “new spiritual Israel” at the end of days. The cult is estimated to have approximately 240,000 followers, and claims to have outposts in 29 countries in addition to South Korea.

Shincheonji’s bad theology makes for worse public health. Shincheonji teaches illness is a sin, encouraging its followers to suffer through diseases to attend services in which they sit closely together, breathing in spittle as they repeatedly amen in unison. If they were off on their own, that might be one thing—but according to Shin Hyeon-uk, a pastor who formerly belonged to the cult, Shincheonji believes in “deceptive proselytizing,” approaching potential converts without disclosing their denomination. Shincheonji convinces its members to cover their tracks, providing a prearranged set of answers to give when anyone asks if they belong to the cult. Often, even family members are in the dark about whether someone is a Shincheonji follower. The net effect is that Shincheonji followers infect each other easily, then go onto infect the community at large.

It is not yet clear exactly how Shincheonji cultists were infected with COVID-19 in the first instance. (KCDC said Patient No. 31 is likely not the first Shincheonji follower to be infected, given the timeline of her symptoms.) Although investigations are still pending, South Korean authorities have been focusing on the funeral of the brother of Shincheonji’s founder held in early February. Shincheonji has 19 churches in China, including in Wuhan, and it may be possible that followers from around the world attended the funeral.

N-1: Apocalyptic Bibtard Numbskulls Concentrated, Incubated, and Superspread Coronavirus

youtube |  Barely more than a week ago, South Korea’s coronavirus outbreak appeared to be contained as the number of confirmed infections stabilized at 30. Sensing a turning tide, many Seoul residents took off their surgical masks and resumed riding the subways and shopping at malls. 

Then, on Feb. 17, a 31st case surfaced at a health clinic in Daegu, a city about 150 miles south of the capital where the vast majority of known infections were located. An unidentified 61-year-old woman, who lived there and occasionally commuted to Seoul, tested positive for the novel coronavirus. It seemed like a standard case until public health authorities started tracing the patient’s tracks. 

What they learned shocked them: the woman had, during the previous 10 days, attended two worship services with at least 1,000 other members of her secretive religious sect whose leader says the end of days is coming. Within 24 hours, the nation’s number of confirmed cases started multiplying exponentially. The tally rose by 20 during that period, doubled the following day and then doubled again on the third day. 

By Wednesday, the count skyrocketed past 1,000 -- a more than 30-fold increase in a week that prompted the government to raise its health alert to the highest level. At least half of the new cases are linked to the sect called the Shincheonji -- which translates to “new heaven and land” and whose members worship side-by-side in cramped spaces. “What made this case so much worse was that this person spent a considerable amount of time in a very crowded area,” said Kim Chang-yup, a professor for health policy at Seoul National University. “There’s growing fear and resentment among the people right now.” South Korea’s health ministry said Wednesday it was launching a manhunt for more than 212,000 members whose names were provided by the sect. Korea’s Centers for Disease Control & Prevention already is screening 9,300 sect members, in addition to those who attended the two services. On Wednesday, it expects to conclude tests of 1,300 sect members showing symptoms.

Shincheonji

Reuters |  An So-young had a gut feeling that the 31st person in South Korea to test positive for the coronavirus might be a member of the controversial religious sect she quit four years ago. 

The person, dubbed “Patient 31,” was the first of an explosive wave of cases that made South Korea’s outbreak the largest outside of China. What caught An’s attention was how health authorities were struggling to track the woman’s movements before she was tested. 

“That’s their culture, they have to hide their movements, and that’s why I guessed she was with Shincheonji,” An, 27, said in an interview, referring to the Shincheonji Church of Jesus. 

Patient 31 attended services at the church’s branch in the southeastern city of Daegu this month, staying for two hours each time, before testing positive on Feb. 18. 

The South Korean disease control chief Jeong Eun-kyeong said the church’s services, where thousands of people sit on the floor, shoulder-to-shoulder, for hours, could have contributed to the surges. 

“You would be 5 centimeters away from the person who sits next to you, and have to say ‘Amen’ after every sentence the pastor speaks - it’s the best environment for the virus to spread,” said An, who is now a theology student. 

In a media interview, Patient 31 said she did not refuse to be tested. But health authorities said she sought care at a traditional medicine hospital in Daegu after a minor car accident, where a medical worker who treated her later tested positive for the virus. While running a fever, she went to a buffet at a hotel and the church services. 

Shincheonji is in the biggest crisis in its 36-year history, as hundreds of members have tested positive for the virus, SARS-CoV-2. All of its 210,000 known followers are being tested amid unprecedented scrutiny from authorities and the public. 

After initial resistance, the church released the addresses of 1,100 facilities around the country - 82 churches and 1,018 “affiliates,” - and asked the public to avoid making “groundless criticism.” It was the “biggest victim of the virus,” it said. 

Calls by Reuters to the church’s headquarters seeking comment went unanswered. 

During a visit to the Daegu branch on Friday, a man who identified himself as a member said he was the only one there and told Reuters that “all of our 9,000 members are taking self-quarantine measures in compliance with the government instruction.” He said the building was disinfected twice last week. 

Interactive graphic about the spread of coronavirus inside South Korea: here

Coronavirus (WARS) Uses HIV Packing Mechanism

SCMP |  The new coronavirus has an HIV-like mutation that means its ability to bind with human cells could be up to 1,000 times as strong as the Sars virus, according to new research by scientists in China and Europe.

The discovery could help to explain not only how the infection has spread but also where it came from and how best to fight it.

Scientists showed that Sars (severe acute respiratory syndrome) entered the human body by binding with a receptor protein called ACE2 on a cell membrane. And some early studies suggested that the new coronavirus, which shares about 80 per cent of the genetic structure of Sars, might follow a similar path.

But the ACE2 protein does not exist in large quantities in healthy people, and this partly helped to limit the scale of the Sars outbreak of 2002-03, in which infected about 8,000 people around the world.

Other highly contagious viruses, including HIV and Ebola, target an enzyme called furin, which works as a protein activator in the human body. Many proteins are inactive or dormant when they are produced and have to be “cut” at specific points to activate their various functions.

When looking at the genome sequence of the new coronavirus, Professor Ruan Jishou and his team at Nankai University in Tianjin found a section of mutated genes that did not exist in Sars, but were similar to those found in HIV and Ebola.

“This finding suggests that 2019-nCoV [the new coronavirus] may be significantly different from the Sars coronavirus in the infection pathway,” the scientists said in a paper published this month on Chinaxiv.org, a platform used by the Chinese Academy of Sciences to release scientific research papers before they have been peer-reviewed.

“This virus may use the packing mechanisms of other viruses such as HIV.”

According to the study, the mutation can generate a structure known as a cleavage site in the new coronavirus’ spike protein.

The virus uses the outreaching spike protein to hook on to the host cell, but normally this protein is inactive. The cleavage site structure’s job is to trick the human furin protein, so it will cut and activate the spike protein and cause a “direct fusion” of the viral and cellular membranes.

Compared to the Sars’ way of entry, this binding method is “100 to 1,000 times” as efficient, according to the study.

Just two weeks after its release, the paper is already the most viewed ever on Chinarxiv.

In 2000 SecDef Cohen Was Skinning and Grinning, CCP SecDef Chi Haotian Was More Serious

jrnyquist |  As everybody knows, according to the views propagated by Western scholars, humanity as a whole originated from one single mother in Africa. Therefore, no race can claim racial superiority. However, according to the research conducted by most Chinese scholars, the Chinese are different from other races on earth. We did not originate in Africa. Instead, we originated independently in the land of China. The Peking Man at Zhoukoudian that we are all familiar with represents a phase of our ancestors’ evolution. “The Project of Searching for the Origins of the Chinese Civilization” currently undertaken in our country is aimed at a more comprehensive and systematic research on the origin, process and development of the ancient Chinese civilization. We use to say, “Chinese civilization has had a history of five thousand years.” But now, many experts engaged in research in varied fields including archeology, ethnic cultures, and regional cultures have reached consensus that the new discoveries such as the Hongshan Culture in the northeast, the Liangahn Cutlure in Zhejiang province, the Jinsha Ruins in Sichuan province, and the Yongzhou Shun Emperor Cultural Site in Hunan province are all compelling evidence of the exitence of China’s early civilizations, and they prove that China’s rice-growing agricultural history alone can be traced back as far as 8,000 to 10,000 years. This refutes the concept of “five thousand years of Chinese civilization.” 

Therefore, we can assert that we are the product of cultural roots of more than a million years, and a single Chinese entity of two thousand years. This is the Chinese entity of two thousand years. This is the Chinese nation that calls itself, “descendants of Yan and Huang,” the Chinese nation that we are so proud of. Hitler’s Germany had once bragged that the German race was the most superior race on earth, but the fact is, our nation is far superior to the Germans.

During our long history, our people have disseminated throughout the Americas and the regions along the Pacific Rim, and they became Indians in the Americas and the East Asian ethnic groups in the South Pacific.

We all know that on account of our national superiority, during the thriving and prosperous Tang Dynasty our civilization was at the peak of the world. We were the center of the world civilization, and no other civilization in the world was comparable to ours. Later on, because of our complacency, narrow-mindedness, and the self-enclosure of our own country, we were surpassed by Western civilization, and the center of the world shifted to the West.

In reviewing history, one may ask: Will the center of the world civilization shift back to China?

Comrade He Xin put it in his report to the Central Committee in 1988: If the fact is that the center of leadership of the world was located in Europe as of the 18th Century, and later shifted to the United States in the mid-20th century the center of leadership of the world will shift to the East of our planet. And, “the East” of course mainly refers to China.

Charles Lieber Is The Father Of EXTREMELY Wuhan Relevant Technology

Harvard |  Two of the world’s biggest threats may someday be reduced by wires thousands of times thinner than a hair but capable of detecting a single virus. The specter of worldwide viral epidemics is always with us, so detecting them quickly offers the possibility of saving thousands of lives. The pathogens also can be stealthy biological weapons, making their positive detection a vital national defense requirement.

“We want to find a single virus before it finds you,” says Charles Lieber, Hyman Professor of Chemistry at Harvard University. Tests recently completed in his laboratory show that these unimaginably thin nanowires can sense and distinguish between viruses that cause flu, measles, and eye infections. Lieber believes future versions will be able to spot HIV, Ebola, SARS, West Nile, hepatitis, bird flu, and other dangerous viruses.

“Viruses are among the most important causes of human disease and are of increasing concern as agents for bioterrorism,” Lieber says. “Our work shows that nanoscale silicon wires can be configured as detectors that turn on or off in the presence of a single virus particle. Such detectors could be fashioned into arrays capable of sensing thousands of different viruses, ushering in a new era for diagnoses, biosafety, and quick response to viral outbreaks.”

“Nano” refers to a “nanometer,” one billionth of a meter, four hundred billionths of an inch, or about 10 atoms in size. One hundred thousand wires, each 20 nanometers long, would fit on the head of a pin.

The Department of Defense, Office of Naval Research, and National Cancer Institute all supported Lieber’s research, and at least two commercial companies have shown interest in manufacturing nanosensors.

In his office, Lieber shows visitors a two-inch-square silicon and metal chip containg an array of nanowires and two pinhead-size entry ports through which blood, saliva, or other bodily fluids can enter. Air samples put into a fluid solution would also be tested this way.

Exact Same Elite Marketing Playbook and Script For Nobody Diversity Candidate Bootyplug

On March 16th 2008 I called out and subsequently rejected the Great "Unifier" after he made his responsible negroe speech and repudiated Rev. Jeremiah Wright. Like Obama, Cheat Bootyplug is a nobody selected by elites from sociopath central casting for the purpose of installing a republican blue dog as the head of the DNC corporatist shill party. Bootyplug is toast with Black and Latino voters, so I'm not quite sure who his handlers thought he could "unify" with his glib, empty rhetoric.

Obama has pegged his Jeremiah Wright response to the speech delivered by Bobby Kennedy in the aftermath of Martin Luther King's assassination;

Kennedy was the first to inform the audience of the death of Martin Luther King, causing some in the audience to scream and wail. Several of Kennedy's aides were even worried that the delivery of this information would result in a riot. Once the audience quieted down Kennedy acknowledged that many in the audience would be filled with anger, especially since the assassin was believed to be a white, and that he had felt the same when his brother John F. Kennedy had been assassinated. These remarks surprised Kennedy aides, who had never heard him speak of John Kennedy's death. Kennedy continued, saying that the country had to make an effort to "go beyond these rather difficult times," and then quoted a poem by the Greek playwright Aeschylus. To conclude Kennedy said that the country needed and wanted unity between blacks and whites, asked the audience members to pray for the King family and the country, and once more quoted the ancient Greeks. Despite rioting in other major American cities, Indianapolis was calm the night after Kennedy's remarks, which is believed to have been in part because of the speech. The speech itself has been listed as one of the greatest in American history, ranked 17th on American Rhetoric's Top 100 speeches in the 20th century. Former US Congressman and media host Joe Scarborough said that it was Kennedy's greatest speech, and was what prompted him into entering into public service. Journalist Joe Klein has called it "politics in its grandest form and highest purpose," and said that it "marked the end of an era" before American political life was taken over by consultants and pollsters. It is also featured as the prologue of his book, Politics Lost.

The Ruling Class Doesn't Want You To Think

libertyblitzkrieg |   It’s important to understand the ruling class doesn’t actually fear Trump or Sanders individually — any one person can be dealt with. What they really fear is you. They fear people flocking to unapproved candidates and then talking about things the establishment doesn’t want them talking about. This is the main reason the whole Russiagate fantasy was unrolled against Trump and pushed hysterically by mass media.

By ensuring “the resistance” to Trump revolved around some invented intelligence agency narrative, the power structure was able to prevent large numbers of people from talking about anything real or significant for four years straight. Although it didn’t remove Trump from office, it successfully reduced hitherto thoughtful people into emotionally broken mental midgets.

This is the reason the exact same tactic was just unrolled against Bernie Sanders, with Jeff Bezos’ Washington Post reporting the day before the Nevada caucuses that Russia is also supposedly helping Sanders. It’s ridiculous, but you have to understand the strategy here. If Sanders can’t be prevented from winning the nomination, the establishment needs a plan B, and that plan appears to be Russiagate all over again. These people aren’t very creative.

When it became clear Trump couldn’t be stopped he was smeared with being a tool of the Russians, and the same seeds are being planted around the Sanders campaign. It doesn’t matter how preposterous it is, the primary goal is to ensure nobody ever talks about anything important. Absent Russia hysteria, a Sanders vs. Trump matchup would quickly become a battle of who’s more populist, and issues that make so-called elites very uncomfortable would become widely discussed.  The ruling class doesn’t want the public talking about such things so they need to turn the election into a complete circus if Sanders can’t be blocked. Instead of talking about economic insecurity, healthcare, the cost of college and wars for empire, the goal is to make Sanders and Trump spend the entire campaign season arguing about who hates Russia more.

The important takeaway here is how completely terrified and decrepit the ruling class of this country really is. They have no argument or philosophy about anything important. As such, their only tactic is to overwhelm the public with nonsense and invented narratives in order to divide, befuddle and control the masses while keeping the imperial oligarchy running exactly as it has for decades. Once you see the game, it’s impossible to unsee it, but the good news is we all possess within ourselves the power they fear most. The power to think for ourselves and to reject ridiculous lies.

Win or Lose the Nomination, Bloomberg Has Already Hijacked the DNC

downwithtyranny |  This is a small point that leads to a larger one. Consider what Mike Bloomberg is building within the Democratic Party, within the DNC. According to the following analysis he's turning the DNC into an anti-Sanders machine, a force loyal to himself, that will operate even after Sanders is nominated, even after Sanders is elected, if he so chooses.

With that he hopes to limit and control what Sanders and his rebellion can do. It's the ultimate billionaire counter-rebellion — own the Party machine that the president normally controls, then use it against him.

Our source for this thought is Glen Ford at Black Agenda Report. Ford is one of the more vitriolic defenders of radical change in America, but in this analysis I don't think he's wrong, at least in making the case that Bloomberg is giving himself that option. But do decide for yourself.

Here's his case:

Bloomberg Wants to Swallow the Democrats and Spit Out the Sandernistas

If, somehow, Bernie Sanders is allowed to win the nomination, Michael Bloomberg and other plutocrats will have created a Democratic Party machinery purpose-built to defy Sanders -- as nominee, and even as president.

The details of his argument are here (emphasis added):
Bloomberg has already laid the groundwork to directly seize the party machinery, the old fashioned way: by buying it and stacking it with his own, paid operatives, with a war-against-the-left budget far bigger than the existing Democratic operation. Bloomberg’s participation in Wednesday’s debate, against all the rules, is proof-of-purchase.

In addition to the nearly million dollar down payment to the party in November that sealed the deal for the debate rules change, Bloomberg has already pledged to pay the full salaries of 500 political staffers for the Democratic National Committee all the way through the November election, no matter who wins the nomination. Essentially, Bloomberg will be running the election for the corporate wing of the party, even if Sanders is the nominee.

Bloomberg: Vampire Squids Are My Peeps - Defending The Squid My First Priority

independent |  Michael Bloomberg called Goldman Sachs bankers his ‘peeps’ and promised to defend them, leaked tape reveals. Presidential candidate Michael Bloomberg is being criticised for telling bankers he would have defended them as president in a leaked audio from a private Goldman Sachs event in 2016.

At the event, Mr Bloomberg first described the audience as his “peeps”, and said that had he run for president that year, his “first campaign platform” would have been “to defend the banks.”

But, he added, “you know how well that’s gonna go down in this country”.

Mr Bloomberg then defended the banks more seriously: “Somebody's gotta stand up and do what we need. A healthy banking system that's going to take risks because that's what creates the jobs for everybody. And nobody's willing to say that.”

The audio was uploaded to hosting platform Soundcloud and sent to CNN and several journalists. The sender used the email address and username “CancelGoldman”, and claimed to have worked at Goldman Sachs for 14 years.

The Bloomberg campaign has confirmed that the audio is real. In an email to CNN, spokesperson Stu Loeser said that much of what Mr Bloomberg said was in jest, and that his remarks were of an analytical standard almost unheard of in current politics.

Bloomberg No Stranger to Gestapo Tactics (Bet Not EVER Get Gestapo Power)

theatlantic |  When last in power, Bloomberg presided over the mistreatment of Democrats who sought to protest Republicans, violating the constitutional rights of hundreds of dissenters.

 At the time, Bloomberg was a first-term Republican mayor of New York. The GOP hoped that holding the 2004 Republican National Convention in the city, a site of the 9/11 terrorist attacks, would help reelect George W. Bush. Protests in deep-blue New York were inevitable. Bloomberg had months to prepare.

And he did. Nearly as soon as the convention location was announced, the police department that Bloomberg presided over launched a secret mission to infiltrate protest groups, The New York Times later reported:

For at least a year before the 2004 Republican National Convention, teams of undercover New York City police officers traveled to cities across the country, Canada and Europe to conduct covert observations of people who planned to protest at the convention, according to police records and interviews.

From Albuquerque to Montreal, San Francisco to Miami, undercover New York police officers attended meetings of political groups, posing as sympathizers or fellow activists, the records show.

Some people planned to break the law during protests, but in hundreds of secret reports, the NYPD “chronicled the views and plans of people who had no apparent intention of breaking the law,” including “members of street theater companies, church groups and antiwar organizations, as well as environmentalists and people opposed to the death penalty, globalization and other government policies.”

Spying was just the beginning.

About Evil Mike Bloomberg and Those NDA's.....,

theintercept | I am one of the many women Mike Bloomberg’s company tried to silence through nondisclosure agreements. The funny thing is, I never even worked for Bloomberg.

But my story shows the lengths that the Bloomberg machine will go to in order to avoid offending Beijing. Bloomberg’s company, Bloomberg LP, is so dependent on the vast China market for its business that its lawyers threatened to devastate my family financially if I didn’t sign an NDA silencing me about how Bloomberg News killed a story critical of Chinese Communist Party leaders.

It was only when I hired Edward Snowden’s lawyers in Hong Kong that Bloomberg LP eventually called off their hounds after many attempts to intimidate me.

In 2012, I was working toward a Ph.D. in sociology at Tsinghua University in Beijing, and my husband, Michael Forsythe, was a lead writer on a Bloomberg News article about the vast accumulation of wealth by relatives of Chinese President Xi Jinping, part of an award-winning “Revolution to Riches” series about Chinese leaders.

Soon after Bloomberg published the article on Xi’s family wealth in June 2012, my husband received death threats conveyed by a woman who told him she represented a relative of Xi. The woman conveying the threats specifically mentioned the danger to our whole family; our two children were 6 and 8 years old at the time. The New Yorker’s Evan Osnos reports a similar encounter in his award-winning book, “Age of Ambition: Chasing Fortune, Truth and Faith in the New China,” when the same woman told Osnos’s wife: “He [Forsythe] and his family can’t stay in China. It’s no longer safe,” she said. “Something will happen. It will look like an accident. Nobody will know what happened. He’ll just be found dead.”

The experience was especially terrifying because it came just months after the murder of a British businessman, Neil Heywood, who was poisoned by the wife of a senior Chinese leader, Bo Xilai, according to Chinese state media. His body was reportedly discovered in a hotel in the southwestern Chinese city of Chongqing. While our family spent the kids’ summer vacation in 2012 outside of China, Bloomberg executives kept my husband busy in nonstop conference calls about how to maintain our security. I had recurring nightmares about my young children getting beaten up or killed. I desperately wanted to speak publicly about the death threats, feeling it would give us stronger protection, but Bloomberg News wanted us not to say anything about it while the company conducted its own internal investigation. I had been loyal to the company ever since my husband and I married in 2002, and I didn’t want to jeopardize his job. I stayed silent until October 26, 2012, when another (unrelated) story was published in defiance of the Chinese government. I decided to tweet that we had received death threats after the Bloomberg story on Xi Jinping.

Within hours of my tweets — the original and my replies to questions — a Bloomberg manager called my husband and said, “Get your wife to delete her tweets.” I did not delete them, but I also did not tweet or speak publicly about the death threats again. I did not want to anger the company because we needed it to relocate us to Hong Kong, where our children would be safe. As we finished the remainder of our time in Beijing, applying for schools in Hong Kong and preparing for our move, I lived in constant fear. Would someone get to our children while they were on their way to or from school? Who was watching and listening to us? I obsessively pulled down all our window blinds at night in case Chinese security agents were watching us. I was careful not to speak loudly about our plans in our home or on my phone in case we were bugged.

In August 2013, I finally relaxed as we flew out of Beijing and moved to a temporary apartment in Hong Kong. I thought that our yearlong nightmare had ended. But things would soon get even worse.
My husband had been working for many months on another investigative report for Bloomberg about financial ties between one of China’s richest men, Wang Jianlin, and the families of senior Communist Party officials, including relatives of Xi. Bloomberg editors had thus far backed the story. A Bloomberg managing editor, Jonathan Kaufman, said in an email in late September 2013, “I am in awe of the way you tracked down and deciphered the financial holdings and the players. … It’s a real revelation. Looking forward to pushing it up the line,” according to an account published by the Financial Times.

Then Bloomberg killed the story at the last minute, and the company fired my husband in November after comments by Bloomberg News editor-in-chief Matt Winkler were leaked. “If we run the story, we’ll be kicked out of China,” Winkler reportedly said on a company call.

Mike Bloomberg Is A Stone Cold Fascist To The Bone

theintercept |  In October 2014, on a stage in San Francisco in front of a live audience, Katie Couric asked Mike Bloomberg whether he had ever “sexted on Snapchat.” The former New York City mayor, speaking alongside Snapchat co-founder Evan Spiegel at the Vanity Fair New Establishment Summit, joked that he “couldn’t answer the question.” But the question prompted Bloomberg to describe his views on data collection, and a personal “Richard Nixon lesson” about record-keeping.

What followed was a lighthearted discussion of digital privacy, in which Bloomberg, now a candidate in the Democratic presidential race, praised the National Security Agency and said he doesn’t have a problem with apps selling users’ personal data, as long as consumers understand what is happening.

“Look, if you don’t want it to be in the public domain, don’t take that picture, don’t write it down. In this day and age, you’ve got to be pretty naive to believe that the NSA isn’t listening to everything and reading every email,” Bloomberg said. “And incidentally, given how dangerous the world is, we should hope they are, because this is really serious, what’s going on in the world.”

Bloomberg’s comments in 2014 came more than a year after the first disclosures of documents by NSA contractor Edward Snowden, but before a federal appeals court ruled that the bulk collection of Americans’ phone records was illegal. Bloomberg did not describe any specific NSA program or form of data collection in detail, but the lighthearted conversation contains insights into his views on digital privacy.

Bloomberg mentioned Snowden by name, saying that because hackers or whistleblowers can obtain and leak records, he joked that he has a rule against keeping records. “And when you write something, you take a picture and somebody leaks it,” Bloomberg said. “How many times does that have to happen before you realize it’s gonna happen again and it could happen to you? And so whether it’s Snowden or some hacker or something, it’s what I call the Richard Nixon lesson: Don’t record it.”

Two-Thirds of Exported nCOVID-19 WARS Cases Undetected

imperial.ac.uk |  Dr Sangeeta Bhatia, report author, explained: “We compared the average monthly number of passengers travelling from Wuhan to major international destinations with the number of COVID-19 cases that have been detected overseas. Based on these data, we then estimate the number of cases that are undetected globally and find that approximately two thirds of the cases might be undetected at this point. Our findings confirm similar analyses carried out by other groups.”

As of 20 February 2020, over 74,000 cases of COVID-19 (formerly 2019-nCoV) have been reported in China (with 2121 deaths). Over 1000 cases have been confirmed in 29 regions and countries outside mainland China (including Hong Kong SAR and Macau SAR).

Dr Natsuko Imai, report author, said: “We are starting to see more cases reported from countries and regions outside mainland China with no known travel history or link to Wuhan City. Our analysis, which extends and confirms previously released analysis by other groups using flight volumes from Wuhan City and the reported number of COVID-19 cases, demonstrates the importance of surveillance and case detection if countries are to successfully contain the epidemic."

Exported cases vary in the severity of their clinical symptoms, making some cases more difficult to detect than others. Some countries have detected significantly fewer than would have been expected based on the volume of flight passengers arriving from Wuhan City, China.

Gina Cuomo-Dannenburg, report author, added: “We compiled data from a variety of publicly available sources, such as national and provincial ministries of health and local news, to determine information about travel history, exposure and symptom onset of individual patients observed outside of mainland China. We would like to thank countries for their continued transparency in presenting information on new cases, and would like to encourage communication of patient outcomes going forward to present a true picture of severity and clinical presentation.”

Based on comparisons with Singapore only, 63% of cases are estimated to be undetected. Comparing with Singapore, Finland, Nepal, Belgium, Sweden, India, Sri Lanka, and Canada, 73% of cases are estimated to be undetected.

WARS - Wuhan Acute Respiratory Syndrome Has Really Set the Stage

strategic-culture |  The New Silk Roads – or Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) – were launched by President Xi Jinping in 2013, first in Central Asia (Nur-Sultan) and then Southeast Asia (Jakarta). 

One year later, the Chinese economy overtook the U.S. on a PPP basis. Inexorably, year after year since the start of the millennium, the U.S. share of the global economy shrinks while China’s increases.

China is already the key hub of the global economy and the leading trade partner of nearly 130 nations.

While the U.S. economy is hollowed out, and the casino financing of the U.S. government – repo markets and all – reads as a dystopian nightmare, the civilization-state steps ahead in myriad areas of technological research, not least because of Made in China 2025.

China largely beats the U.S. on patent filings and produces at least 8 times as many STEM graduates a year than the U.S., earning the status of top contributor to global science.

A vast array of nations across the Global South signed on to be part of BRI, which is planned for completion in 2049. Last year alone, Chinese companies signed contracts worth up to $128 billion in large-scale infrastructure projects in dozen of nations.

The only economic competitor to the U.S. is busy reconnecting most of the world to a 21^st century, fully networked version of a trade system that was at its peak for over a millennia: the Eurasian Silk Roads.

Inevitably this state of things is something interlocking sectors of the U.S. ruling class simply would not accept.

If You Go To The Trouble Of Creating A Weapon, Sooner Or Later You're Going To Use It

LewRockwell |  Those that prevent disease and expose virus creation are heroic, but those that create and purposely spread disease and virus are inhuman. Given the history of the United States government and its military industrial complex concerning biological and germ warfare, the use of these agents against large populations, and the desire to create agents that are race specific strains, these powerful entities have become compassionless purveyors of death to the innocent. Manmade viruses meant for warfare, whether for economic destruction, starvation, or mass death, are the workings of the truly evil among us. Predation at this level is relegated to those in power; a president for example, could give the order to wipe out millions due to his inability to control a problem he caused and perpetuated, and then lay blame on the victims.

Who would ever have believed that modern warfare could be more brutal, more torturous, more painful, and more harmful to innocents, especially children, than past atrocities committed in war. Memories of millions sent to their deaths fighting in trenches, cities obliterated by atomic bombs, entire countries destroyed, and millions purposely left to starve in order to appease some tyrant or elected “leader.” I once thought that nuclear war would signal the end of life as we know it, but considering modern warfare and technology, I now think that uncontrolled and deadly viruses may consume the world population, as one after another poisons are released as acts of hidden war. There can be no end to this madness, as any retaliation in kind will result in the spread of worldwide disease; all created by man.

The new Coronavirus, (2019 Novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV) one in a line of many that were not just likely but most certainly produced by man in laboratories, is affecting almost exclusively the Chinese at this point. This has seemingly opened the floodgates to speculation as to its exact origin. This virus has unique characteristics that have happened before with SARS and MERS, and has genetic material that has never been identified, and is not tied to any animal or human known virus. This should be troubling to all, because if this is manmade, it was manufactured as a weapon of war. So who is responsible for its release in China? It is possible that this virus was created in China and was “accidentally” released into the population, but that does not sound credible at any level. Do any think that the Chinese government would create a Chinese race specific virus and release it in their country?

Interestingly, in the past, U.S. universities and NGOs went to China specifically to do illegal biological experimentation, and this was so egregious to Chinese officials, that forcible removal of these people was the result. Harvard University, one of the major players in this scandal, stole the DNA samples of hundreds of thousands of Chinese citizens, left China with those samples, and continued illegal bio-research in the U.S. It is thought that the U.S. military, which puts a completely different spin on the conversation, had commissioned the research in China at the time. This is more than suspicious.