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WHO Team Visits Wuhan Institute of Virology on COVID-19 Origins Investigation Mission

© AFP 2023 / HECTOR RETAMALThis aerial view shows the P4 laboratory (C) on the campus of the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province on May 13, 2020.
This aerial view shows the P4 laboratory (C) on the campus of the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province on May 13, 2020. - Sputnik International, 1920, 03.02.2021
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MOSCOW (Sputnik) - The team of experts from the World Health Organization (WHO) visited the Wuhan Institute of Virology on Wednesday, as part of their mission to investigate the origins of COVID-19, local media reported.

The WHO team visited the P4 lab inside the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the state-owned Global Times reported.

The team of WHO experts arrived in Wuhan on January 14 to investigate the origins of COVID-19, as the world's first cluster of infected patients were detected in the city in December 2019. The WHO team only began field work last week, after completing two weeks of quarantine upon arrival.

A member of the World Health Organization team is seen wearing protective gear during a field visit to the Hubei Animal Disease Control and Prevention Centre for another day's field visit in Wuhan in central China's Hubei province Tuesday, 2 February 2021. - Sputnik International, 1920, 02.02.2021
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The team has visited local hospitals where the first wave of COVID-19 patients were treated and a local market that was believed to be associated with the first cluster of infected patients.

The Wuhan Institute of Virology became a focal point of the WHO team's mission in China, after a number of conspiracy theories suggested that the new coronavirus, known as SARS-CoV-2, may have leaked from the secretive lab where thousands of coronavirus samples were collected and stored.

© AP Photo / HECTOR RETAMAL(FILES) This file photo taken on April 17, 2020 shows an aerial view of the P4 laboratory at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province
WHO Team Visits Wuhan Institute of Virology on COVID-19 Origins Investigation Mission - Sputnik International, 1920, 03.02.2021
(FILES) This file photo taken on April 17, 2020 shows an aerial view of the P4 laboratory at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan in China's central Hubei province

Shi Zhengli, a leading virologist at the Wuhan lab, is widely known as the "bat woman" for her extensive research into the coronavirus that caused the Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) in China in 2003. Shi spent more than five years to collect coronavirus samples from bat caves in southwestern China. Her research reached the conclusion that the coronavirus that caused SARS came from the horseshoe bats found in those caves.

Zhang Jixian, director of respiratory medicine at the Hubei Provincial Hospital of Integrated Chinese and Western Medicine, was first to report the unusual pneumonia infection that was later identified as COVID-19, on December 27, 2019. - Sputnik International, 1920, 28.12.2020
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One of the popular conspiracy theories suggested that SARS-CoV-2 may have been accidentally leaked from Shi's lab. But Shi made several public statements denying such allegations.

In a research report released last week, Dr. Steven Quay, who used to be on the faculty of Stanford University School of Medicine, suggested that there was a 99.8 percent possibility that SARS-CoV-2 came from a laboratory and only a 0.2 percent likelihood that it came from nature.

"Like many others, I am concerned about what appear to be significant conflicts of interest between members of the WHO team and scientists and doctors in China and how much this will impede an unbiased examination of the origin of SARS-CoV-2," said Dr. Quay.

Chinese authorities have consistently denied such allegations of a possible lab leak and began to spread alternative theories that SARS-CoV-2 may have originated from other countries.

Chinese Foreign Ministry Spokesman Wang Wenbin suggested on Tuesday that the US government should also invite WHO experts to investigate the possibility of SARS-CoV-2 originating from the United States.

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