A Parisian scientist accidentally discovered the details of the study of the origin of COVID-19: they hid a raccoon dog

One of the most compelling clues to the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic was uploaded unannounced to a scientific database and went unnoticed for weeks. And then, just as suddenly, she disappeared from public view.

Genetic data from swabs taken at the Huanan Seafood Market in Wuhan, China, weeks after COVID-19 first emerged, has been available online for just as long as it took a Parisian scientist to stumble upon it while working from her sofa on a Saturday afternoon at the start. this month.

“I don’t have a good work-life balance,” says Florence Debarre, an evolutionary biologist whose accidental discovery of files led to the first confirmation that animals susceptible to the coronavirus were present at a market in Wuhan.

Her findings, which she and her colleagues posted online last week, shed light on the path ahead to uncover the origins of the pandemic, as well as the treacherous path facing scientists seeking to follow it. Since the publication, Debarr has been attacked by online haters and has received threats to her safety. “Last night I burst into tears because of the terrible things that I read about myself on social networks,” she admits.

Florence Debarre, a senior researcher at France’s National Center for Scientific Research, is one of thousands of scientists around the world trying to trace the path of the virus to humans since late 2019. In early March, she was looking into the Gisaid virology database when she came across something unusual. These were thousands of raw genetic sequences from swabs that Chinese scientists had taken in early 2020 from the floors, cages, walls and surfaces of a market in Wuhan where the first cases of coronavirus infection were found.

A preliminary analysis of the same swabs, published by the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CCDC) in February 2022, claimed they contained human DNA and traces of the coronavirus, but found no indication of which animal species were most likely to carry the virus. .

Their findings supported the arguments of some Chinese officials that the Wuhan market was just a place for the virus to spread among humans, and not a cradle where it made its first fateful jump from animals to humans. But when DeBarr and her colleagues analyzed the same data, they got a different result. “There was a Latin name for a raccoon dog, and more than once,” she says. “It was one of the greatest emotions of my life.”

Raccoon dogs, omnivorous East Asian relatives of the fox, are highly susceptible to coronavirus infections and shed the virus in sufficient quantities to infect animals and people around them. In other words, it was confirmed that “the suspect was present at the scene,” explains The Guardian.

Debarr points out that DNA from other animals was also found in the swabs and that there is still no conclusive evidence that the raccoon dogs sold on the market were the carriers of the virus or the means of its first spread to humans. “But now there is no denying that they were there,” she says.

The next step will be to investigate the illegal supply chains that brought raccoon dogs and other animals to the Wuhan market in the winter of 2019 and see if they can lead closer to the original reservoir of the virus, which is still suspected to be bats.

But a step forward in solving one mystery gave rise to others, notes The Guardian.

DeBarr says that, in accordance with the rules of the Gisaid database, her team approached the Chinese scientists who posted the genetic data online to ask them for permission to analyze it, which she says was granted. A day later, they emailed again to share their discovery that raccoon dog DNA was present in the sequences.

The files were unavailable the next day, apparently at the request of Chinese researchers, which include leading virologist George Gao, former CEO of CCDC. “We were shocked,” says Debarr. “But I’m not surprised.”

A member of her team contacted his Chinese counterparts to find out why the data was blocked. “It’s a complicated story,” Debarre says delicately. “The short answer is that we are not cooperating right now.”

Gisaid said in a statement that it removed the sequences from view because they were incomplete and part of a study that was still being peer-reviewed, suggesting that DeBarr and her team may have “outwitted” the Chinese scientists if they had published first. . Debarre said her team did their best to collaborate and that their report was never meant to compete with a peer-reviewed journal article.

To the storm of questions swirling around the origins of COVID-19, this latest episode added even more, The Guardian notes. Why were swab results taken in the early months of COVID-19 hidden from the scientific community for more than three years? Why did the first version of the Chinese study claim that no raccoon dog DNA had been found? And why were the genetic sequences quietly uploaded to Gisaid – left online long enough to be discovered – and then removed from public view?

Debarre is determined not to be distracted by the intrigue around her report. “I’m a scientist,” she says. “I am not a politician or an activist.”

It’s a vital distinction, but in searching for the answer to perhaps the world’s most burning scientific question, she realizes it can also be naive.

Since her report went viral last week, DeBarr has been the target of abuse and conspiracy theories circulating on the Internet, mostly among people who support the theory that the virus was leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, located about 30 minutes drive from the market. “Now I am going through the worst days of my life,” she admits.

Of greatest concern were threats from a stranger who claims to know where Debarre lives. But she was also stung by accusations that, as a scientist, she might be disloyal to the truth. “It’s terrible when people discuss the fact that you might be lying when you’re not lying,” she says. “When you have a profession in which it is very important to be truthful.”

There is no hard evidence for the coronavirus lab leak theory, but it has received a boost in recent weeks with reports that US government agencies have concluded that it is possible, albeit with low to moderate certainty. The Biden administration has said it will release the evidence behind its agencies’ assessments in the coming months.

Despite the pressure, Florence Debarre says he will continue to investigate the origin of the virus.