Editorial (open access) Journal of Human Security, published Dec 18, 2020 http://www.librelloph.com/journalofhumansecurity/article/view/johs-16.1.53 I briefly make case that “gain of function” (GOF) research (ie “serial passage” of pathogens, generally viral, in a laboratory) is possible explanation for COVID-19 origin 1/n

Thought this several months. I try to be neutral, but document several cases of now proven opacity and mistaken reports by Dr Shi, leading “bat woman” scientist at Wuhan Inst of Virology. My paper also suggests heat stress in bats might be partial cause of viral spillover 2/n

ie mainstream & alternative hypothesis are each deeply disturbing. On ABC RN Health Report today (Dec 21, 2020) https://abc.net.au/radionational/programs/healthreport/coronavirus-our-pandemic-year-in-review/12998796 Prof Raina MacIntyre (UNSW Global Biosecurity) also makes the case that GOF could be a credible explanation for the origin of COVID-19. 3/n

As far as I know this is the 3rd hint by a mainstream public health authority in Australia (others Nikolai Petrovsky (Flinders) & myself) [please tell me who I have left out!!] challenging dominant view. If you have time to watch https://raiplay.it/video/2020/11/SARS-COV2---Identikit-di-un-Killer-f4b539cc-07ac-41c2-a1a4-1aab862f75ff.html you will see that 4/n

@profamirattaran (Univ of Ottawa) likens gain of function research, today, to atomic weapons research in the 1940s. In the 55th minute he say GOF is “like playing with nuclear material to build a bomb”; he again appears about 1 hour mark. Whole doco worth watching. 5/n

Ralph Baric, leading US GOF expert, is also interviewed. It is now known, from FOI requests, that Baric declined to sign Lancet letter (also supported by head of Wellcome Trust, @JeremyFarrar) which tried to quash any hint of an alternative explanation https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(20)30418-9 6/n

In same doc @EcoHealthNYC deny they conduct GOF research in China (about 1 hr 3 mins). I was co-editor of the journal EcoHealth for almost 4 years; in 2012 co-authored an editorial on GOF ("dual use") https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10393-012-0768-4 I managed to insert some language warning of risk 7/8

In summary, the Anthropocene not only includes deforestation, animal trafficking, viral mixing, climate etc but also lab escapes, vaccine contamination (eg SV40) & GOF. The external milieu not just famine or hot war; it's also opacity and cold war. It's not binary, it's both. 8/8