Gain-of-Function Research is Central to the Claim the Virus Originated in the Wuhan Lab and Evidence of This Research is Irrefutable
Three Years After the Pandemic Began, House GOP Calls for Investigation Into Origins of SARS-CoV-2
Three years after the pandemic began, House Republicans are officially relaunching their investigation into the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic by calling for testimony and information from Dr. Anthony Fauci and other current and former Biden administration officials.
Source: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/02/13/house-oversight-investigation-covid- origins/11251167002/
The 12-member coronavirus response subcommittee chaired by Rep. James Comer, is charged with examining the origins of the pandemic, including federal funding of what’s known as gain-of-function research, or research that enhances a virus’s ability to cause an infection in order to predict pandemics and develop cures.
The examination of gain-of-function research is central to the claim the virus originated from a lab in Wuhan, China, that was potentially backed by funding from the U.S. government.
What is gain-of-function research?
By now everyone has heard the term “gain-of-function”. By definition gain-of-function is a research process that aims to genetically alter a virus or organism in a way that may enhance the biological functions to gain (or lose) function on its host range, transmissibility, or pathogenicity.
This type of work is performed using reverse genetic systems to rapidly engineer viruses with desired mutations to study the virus.
The eight-plasmid pol I–pol II system for the generation of influenza A virus.
Source: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC18566/
Reverse genetics is a method in molecular genetics that is used to help understand the function(s) of a gene by analyzing the phenotypic effects caused by genetically engineering specific nucleic acid sequences within the gene. For influenza A virus, reverse-genetics systems have not only allowed the manipulation of the viral genome but have also allowed virologists to swap and/or mix and match gene segments from various influenza viruses to create new viruses.
This type of work is generally performed in order to identify gene or amino acid changes that are important markers for viruses found in nature that may have pandemic potential.
But this type of work is the epitome of gain-of-function research.
There Were Concerns About Gain-of-Function Experiments a Decade Prior to the Pandemic
In 2011 researchers at Erasmus Medical Center in the Netherlands reported a study showing that it takes as few as five mutations to turn the H5N1 avian influenza virus into an airborne spreader in mammals. Fouchier's study was one of two H5N1 transmissibility experiments that sparked a fierce controversy.
Another study, led by Yoshihiro Kawaoka, DVM, PhD, of the University of Wisconsin used a somewhat different approach to achieve the same goal as Fouchier. Kawaoka and colleagues introduced mutations in the hemagglutinin (HA) gene from an H5N1 virus and then combined it with seven genes from a 2009 H1N1 virus, creating a hybrid virus that was able to spread by air between ferrets, the gold standard animal model for studying flu viruses.
In addition to introducing direct mutations in viral genes, another method used to generate changes is by passaging a virus in a new host. Researchers at Erasmus found that mutations did not produce a virus that grew more vigorously in ferrets, and the virus did not spread through the air from infected ferrets to uninfected ones.
“Seeing that the this mutant failed to achieve airborne transmission, the researchers decided to "passage" this strain through a series of ferrets in an effort to force it to adapt to the mammalian respiratory tract.”
The amount of mutant virus found in the nasal turbinate and nose swab samples increased with the number of passages.
This was the first time humans had ever broken the barrier between non-transmissibility and transmissibility of a pathogen in animals.
This work was considered dual-use research of concern, meaning research that is intended to provide a clear benefit, but which could easily be misapplied to do harm. The concern was that publishing the study could lead to the unleashing of a dangerous virus and this launched a historic debate on scientific accountability and transparency.
A moratorium was then placed on this type of research due to concerns over publication of how the work was done. In January 2012, researchers agreed on a voluntary pause of 60 days on any research involving highly pathogenic avian influenza H5N1 viruses leading to the generation of viruses that are more transmissible in mammals. In the summer of 2012, the U.S. Government proposed an indefinite continuation of the moratorium on gain-of-function studies that ended up lasting more than four years. Of course Dr. Anthony Fauci defended publishing the full details.
"I think the benefits that will come out of the Fouchier paper in stimulating thought and pursuing ways to understand better the transmissibility, adaptation, pathogenicity [of H5N1] in my mind far outweigh the risk of nefarious use of this information."
FORESHADOWING
Michael T. Osterholm, PhD, MPH, director of the University of Minnesota's Center for Infectious Disease Research and Policy warned "We're making it much easier for everyone to do this," he said. "What if some vaccine manufacturing company in a developing country decides they want to work with this and it gets out?"
After much discussion and the decision to implement stricter guidelines for these type of experiments, the National Institutes of Health announced in December 2017 that it was lifting a funding pause dating back to October 2014 on gain-of-function (GOF) experiments involving influenza, SARS, and MERS viruses.
Gain-of-Function Work was Being Performed with Coronaviruses
Reverse genetics systems for coronaviruses were developed and reported as early as the year 2000. In 2003, using a panel of contiguous cDNAs that spanned the entire genome researchers assembled a full-length cDNA of the SARS-CoV Urbani strain. Researchers claimed the availability of a full-length cDNA would provide a genetic approach to manipulate the SARS-CoV genome for vaccine development and to explore the complexity of the genome. Using another approach, bacterial artificial chromosomes clone (BAC) carrying an infectious genome of the SARS-CoV Urbani strain was generated in just three steps in 2006.
“The SARS reverse genetic system developed as a BAC constitutes a useful tool for the study of fundamental viral processes and also for developing genetically defined vaccines.”
A study published in November 2015 by Ralph Baric’s group at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, is the smoking gun for gain-of-function research with SARS-CoV. It clearly states in the abstract that they used reverse genetics to engineer a chimeric virus.
"Using the SARS-CoV reverse genetics system2, we generated and characterized a chimeric virus expressing the spike of bat coronavirus SHC014 in a mouse-adapted SARS-CoV backbone. The results indicate that group 2b viruses encoding the SHC014 spike in a wild-type backbone can efficiently use multiple orthologs of the SARS receptor human angiotensin converting enzyme II (ACE2), replicate efficiently in primary human airway cells and achieve in vitro titers equivalent to epidemic strains of SARS-CoV."
Once the pandemic was declared editors of the journal Nature Medicine felt the need to put a disclaimer on this article that is clearly gaslighting.
"30 March 2020 Editors’ note, March 2020: We are aware that this article is being used as the basis for unverified theories that the novel coronavirus causing COVID-19 was engineered. There is no evidence that this is true; scientists believe that an animal is the most likely source of the coronavirus."
As stated in the acknowledgement section, research in this manuscript was supported by grants from the National Institute of Allergy & Infectious Disease (NIAID) and the National Institute of Aging of the US National Institutes of Health (NIH). In addition one of the authors was Zhengli-Li Shi of the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
Gain-of-Function Research was Funded by NIAID
Other research with coronaviruses was being funded by NIAID and details of the grants can be found at reporter.nih.gov. This funding was awarded to EcoHealth Alliance from 2008 until the present day for research aimed at understanding the risk of zoonotic coronavirus emergence. Aim 3 of project number 2R01AI110964-01 funded in 2014 clearly states the use of reverse genetics to study coronaviruses, as well as passaging of viruses in animal models.
Source: reporter.nih.gov
Aim 3. Test predictions of CoV inter-species transmission. Predictive models of host range (i.e. emergence potential) will be tested experimentally using reverse genetics, pseudovirus and receptor binding assays, and virus infection experiments across a range of cell cultures from different species and humanized mice.
Research with SARS-like coronaviruses should have been halted and all funding for this type of research should have been frozen in 2020 once the pandemic was declared. This type of research should NOT proceed until the true origin of the SARS-CoV-2 has been determined.