“FIVE FREEDOMS” – CITIZENS’ CORNER: Censored evidence about Dr Ralph Baric’s Gain of Function research and his NIH/NIAID Funding:
1. “University of North Carolina virologist Ralph Baric collaborated with Shi Zhengli on a gain-of-function
Coronavirus experiment in 2015. In February 2020, he privately expressed support for Peter Daszak’s Lancet
statement dismissing the lab-leak theory. More recently, he signed a letter calling for a transparent
investigation of all hypotheses.”
- Nature.com article about Dr Baric’s generation and characterization of a ‘chimeric virus’ that was replicated
in mouse lung with ‘notable pathogenesis’:
https://www.nature.com/articles/nm.3985
‘Here we examine the disease potential of a SARS-like virus, SHC014-CoV, which is currently circulating in
Chinese horseshoe bat populations1. 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. Additionally, in vivo experiments demonstrate replication of the chimeric virus
in mouse lung with notable pathogenesis.’
Dr Shi Zheng-Li, or ‘Bat Lady’, is listed at the end of that article under Dr Baric’s ‘Affiliations’: ‘Key
Laboratory of Special Pathogens and Biosafety, Wuhan Institute of Virology, Chinese Academy of Sciences,
Wuhan, China Xing-Yi Ge & Zhengli-Li Shi’
- MIT Technology Review article shows that Dr Baric’s research — what he called ‘the risk of creating more
dangerous pathogens’ – (which is one definition of Gain of Function research) might be seen, as he put it,
by ‘scientific review panels’ as ‘too risky to pursue’:
From the MIT Technology Review:
“His [Dr Baric’s] 2015 paper, “A SARS-like cluster of circulating bat coronaviruses shows potential for human
emergence,” was a tour de force, utilizing bleeding-edge genetic technology to alert the civilized world to a
looming danger on its periphery. It also revived concerns about gain-of-function experiments, which Baric had
known it would. In the paper, he spelled out the extra precautions he’d taken and held up the research as a
test case. “The potential to prepare for and mitigate future outbreaks must be weighed against the risk of
creating more dangerous pathogens,” he wrote. “Scientific review panels may deem similar studies building
chimeric viruses based on circulating strains too risky to pursue.”
The NIH decided the risk was worth it. In a potentially fateful decision, it funded work similar to Baric’s at the
Wuhan Institute of Virology, which soon used its own reverse-genetics technology to make numerous
coronavirus chimeras.”
A National Academy of Sciences book about a ‘Gain of Function’ research workshop at which a representative
of NIH/NIAID and Dr Baric presented: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK285579. This discussion
shows concern among the scientists aboit both risks and optics of ‘GoF’ research.
- A ten million dollar NIH grant for Dr Baric’s research:https://sph.unc.edu/sph-news/baric-to-lead-10-million-nih-grant/
5. NIH funding for Dr Baric’s SARS bat coronavirus research:
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4797993/6. Dr Baric’s lab associate Dr Eric Donaldson’s CV:
https://sph.unc.edu/wp-content/uploads/sites/112/2016/03/710272645_cv1.pdf
“RESEARCH EXPERIENCE
1. Research Assistant Professor
I am currently employed as a Research Assistant Professor in the Department of Epidemiology, working in
the lab of Dr. Ralph Baric. I am funded by the NIAID to conduct a study looking at the viruses in bats and
studying how viruses cross the species barrier to emerge into new populations. In addition, I am working
with Dr. Baric to resurrect bat coronaviruses to determine the cross species transmission potential of a
variety of novel coronaviruses identified in bats.”
- Also from the Donaldson CV:“b. An R01 grant to the National Institutes of Health
Proposal type R01 PI: Donaldson 07/01/11 – 06/30/16 NIH $1,850,000 25% FTE
Cross species emergence of coronaviruses from bats
This work builds upon our ARRA grant, which allowed us to discover a novel Coronavirus in bats that is
closely related to a human pathogen, human Coronavirus 229E. The major goals of the proposal are to
characterize the coronaviruses found in bat species in the northeastern United States, by sequencing several
bat fecal samples to determine the complete genomic sequences, isolate and/or synthetically resurrect these
coronaviruses using in silico biology, and assess the ability of these viruses to emerge into the human host
by using orthologous receptors and homologous innate immune factors such as interferon antagonists.’
