Sharri Markson: COVID-19 has set the stage for biological warfare

Whether it started in a wet market or lab, the destruction to societies and economies by COVID-19 has set the stage for biological warfare at a larger scale, showing hostile states the damage that can be done, writes Sharri Markson.

• The secret history of the WHO
• Wuhan wet markets add insult to injury

The tale China wants the world to blindly swallow behind the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic is that it came from a wet market in Wuhan.
A highly infectious virus has swept the world, sparking an unprecedented shutdown of economies and closure of borders, not to mention 145,550 lives lost – and counting.
Yet attempts to investigate the substance behind China’s claim that the virus originated in a Wuhan wet market is met with outrage from its government, echoed by roars of indignation from the left, amid accusations of peddling conspiracy theories.
We know that scientists who have studied COVID-19 closely, analysing its DNA, say it was not engineered in a lab and believe a bat was the most likely original source of the coronavirus.

A worker wearing a face mask as he throws ice into a pool with fish at a shop at the Baishazhou Market in Wuhan. Photo by Hector Retmal

But it is the next step that is not conclusively known.
How was this virus then unleashed into the world. Was it through a wet market, like China claims, or was it through a biological research laboratory in Wuhan?
The case is now mounting that the virus may have been released from a Chinese lab.
This week Washington Post foreign policy and national security columnist, Josh Rogin, published explosive diplomatic cables that showed there have been serious concerns around biosecurity a Wuhan laboratory.
There are two labs in Wuhan that work with viruses: The Wuhan Institute of Virology and the Wuhan Centre for Disease Control and Prevention lab.
One of these labs, the Wuhan Institute of Virology, has been “conducting risky studies on coronaviruses from bats”, Rogin reported.
In simple terms, their stated purpose was to study the virus and how it can spread in order to prevent a pandemic.

The Wuhan Institute of Virology is at the centre of the COVID-19 pandemic.

Not only was it working on a virus from bats but there were serious concerns about the lack of security around the deadly pathogens.
United States diplomats, including the Consul General in Wuhan, Jamison Fouss, visited the laboratory in January 2018 and were so concerned by the lack of safety precautions they sent two “Sensitive but Unclassified” cables back to Washington raising the alarm. “The first cable, which I obtained, also warns that the lab’s work on bat coronaviruses and their potential human transmission represented a risk of a new SARS-like pandemic,” Rogin reported.
Given the coronavirus sweeping the world, that cable sent just two years ago is a sensational revelation.
Fox News also revealed there is growing confidence the virus “likely escaped the Wuhan laboratory with a worker spreading it to the larger population’’.
Fox News reported that “the initial transmission of the virus – a naturally occurring strain that was being studied there – was bat-to-human and that ‘patient zero’ worked at the laboratory, then went into the population in Wuhan’’.

Medical workers check information as they take swab samples from people to be tested for the COVID-19 novel coronavirus in Wuhan.

There has been heated debate in the scientific and security communities for many years before this about whether labs that research an increase in the virulence or host range of dangerous pathogens are worth the immense risk of actually creating a more deadly version of a coronavirus or leaking one that originated from animals.
The US Government banned funding for research on viruses that cause SARS, influenza and MERS (Middle East respiratory syndrome) in 2014.
On top of this are revelations China kept news of the virus outbreak secret, with doctors who raised concerns about it mysteriously disappearing or dying.
One whistleblower, Dr Li Wenliang, 34 tried to warn fellow medical professionals about the outbreak but was condemned by Chinese police and authorities for spreading “false information”.
It is now very possible that China had a greater role than President Xi Jinping has admitted in the release of this deadly pandemic.
The Associated Press has also reported that top Chinese officials sat on news of the virus for nearly a week before telling citizens about the outbreak.

Residents wearing face mask purchase seafood at a wet market in January 28.

Worse, China covered up news of the pandemic from the rest of the world for at least a month from November 2019, during which time travel continued in and out of the epicentre of the pandemic, spreading the virus all around the world, and cruelling economies and costing lives.
The fact the virus may have been released from a Wuhan laboratory is far from a conspiracy theory, as the left would have you believe.
It’s a working theory and a credible one.
The advice to the Australian government in February was that there was a 50 per cent chance it was transmitted from a laboratory and may have been manufactured, three senior government sources confirmed to me at the time.
By March, this was downgraded to a 5 per cent chance, but it still could not be ruled out.
Yet Media Watch’s Paul Barry mocked Bronwyn Bishop’s claim the virus was a biological weapon while The Guardian’s Amanda Meade wrote that news of this advice to government was a “bizarre claim’’.

Chinese President Xi Jinping talks by video with patients and medical workers in Wuhan.

The fact is, there is no definitive evidence to prove any of the theories about COVID-19’s original release.
They are all being investigated by the United States, as Donald Trump and Secretary of State, Mike Pompeo have confirmed.
Given the scale of this pandemic, it is unacceptable for the World Health Organisation to shrug its shoulders and for China’s response to be its usual spin, propaganda and denials.
If inquiries show China deliberately covered-up the coronavirus, there will be consequences around the world.
The UK may “reconsider” its relationship with China and there is speculation it could revoke its Huawei deal.
One strong option Australia could take is a forced divestment of the Port of Darwin.
This would escalate an already tense relationship and may not be a course of action Morrison is willing to take.
How Trump decides to respond would have global ramifications.
Whatever the truth about the release of COVID-19, its effective destruction of societies around the world has set the stage for biological warfare at a larger scale now by showing hostile states what can be done.