Exclusive: Chinese scientists have sequenced the first genome COVID-19 speaks of Controversies Its work environment

In recent years, Professor Zhang Yongzhen has produced results in thousands of previously unknown virus. But he knew immediately that this was particularly bad. It was about 01:30 on January 3 that a metal box came to the drab, beige building, the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center House. Inside was a test tube containing packed in dry ice pads from a patient who sweeps China in a central area of ​​the peculiar city of Wuhan pneumonia. But little did she know Zhang that the field would also trigger a vicious barrage of blame and acrimony worthy geopolitical Pandora itself. Now he is looking to set the record straight. Zhang and his team for the work, sample analysis with the latest high-throughput sequencing technology for viral RNA using the genetic components that work similar to DNA works in humans. With 2:00 on January 5, after working for two nights in a row, they had zuzugeordnet the first complete genome of the virus that has now sickened 23 million and killed 810,000 around the world: SARS-CoV-2. “It took less than 40 hours, so very, very fast,” says Zhang TIME in an exclusive interview. “Then I realized that this virus closely related to SARS, probably 80%. So sure was very dangerous.” The events that followed the discovery of Zhang shrouded in controversy as a service. Crises generate scapegoat and coronavirus is no different. The sick US response to the pandemic has prompted a wave of racially colored soundbites as “China virus” and “Kung influence” for deviation of President Donald Trump administrative fault tested for the nation in which the pathogen has been identified. “The outbreak of COVID angered many people in the administration and set an election issue for President Trump,” Ambassador Jeffrey Bader, former chief adviser to President Obama for Asia, said at a recent meeting of the Foreign Correspondents in China Club. Read more: Inside the global Quest trace the origins of COVID-19 and predict where it is to get the first genome, Zhang immediately says Dr. Zhao Su, head of Pneumology Central Hospital in Wuhan called to request data clinical patient in question. “I could not say that it is more dangerous than SARS, but I told him, it is certainly more dangerous than the flu or the H5N1 influenza virus,” says Zhang. Then the Chinese Ministry of Health and traveled to Wuhan brought into contact, in which he said public health officials about 8. Dinner “in January until I got two decisions: first, that there is a SARS-like virus state; Secondly, it transmits the virus through the respiratory tract. And so I had two suggestions: that we should take some emergency public policies to protect against this disease, also should develop clinical antiviral treatments. “Then he returned to Shanghai Zhang and the trip to Beijing prepared for further meetings. On the morning of January 11 he was on the track of Shanghai Hongqiao, when he received a phone call from a colleague, Professor Edward Holmes at the University of Sydney. A few minutes later, Zhang was publicly published the genome for the beginning and still on the phone tied then asked permission Holmes. “I asked Eddie thought for one minute ‘me,” recalls Zhang. “Then I said ok.” For the next two hours, Zhang was the cocoon from the world at 35,000 feet, but Holmes’ e sent to the site of Virological.org shock waves through the global scientific community. At that time, Zhang’s up to Beijing, about his discovery had titles. The officials swooped into his lab to ask for explanations. “Maybe they could not understand how you get the sequence of the genome so fast,” says Zhang. “Maybe you do not fully believe our genome. So, I think it’s normal for the authorities to control our laboratory, our protocols” Read more. China says that the coronavirus is beating. But we believe his numbers? Critics say China has attached 11 at the time of publication in January as evidence of a cover-up: Why, you ask, Zhang has published on January 5, when it is finished for the first time the sequence? In addition, Zhang lab was probed by the Chinese authorities for “disorders” an unknown term to imply something of ill repute. To many observers, it seemed that angry officials obliterate evidence of the outbreak punished Zhang scrambling simply to share the genome of SARS-CoV-2 and, in the meantime, a slowdown of the publication of this important information. However, Zhang denies Western media reports that his lab suffered any prolonged closure, and instead says it has been working hard in the early days of the outbreak. “From late January to April, we have over 30,000 screened virus samples,” said Wu Fan, a researcher Zhang with the first support SARS-CoV-2-sequencing. He says, in fact, Zhang has initially confirmed that the genome of the US National Center for Biotechnology Information (NCBI) at 5 uploaded a January statement, the deadline for the gene bank of the United States government institute. “When we published the genome, on January 5, certainly the United States on this virus has done,” he says. But it can be sought in a model, given the NCBI days or even take weeks, and the severity of the situation and urging buoyancy colleagues, Zhang chose to accelerate its release to the public through the online publication. (Come long deferred Holmes Zhang version of events.) It is a decision that has facilitated the rapid development of test kits, as well as in the early discussion of antivirals and possible vaccines. Read more: We share our vaccine with the world ‘within the Chinese biotech companies leading the fight against COVID-19 Zhang, 55, he is ready to play down the courage of his actions. But the stakes to do what is right than what you are told, are made much higher in authoritarian regimes like China. Several medical informant were arrested in the early years of the pandemic. seen by an order on January 3 to be respected Beijing-based financial magazine Caixin, China National Health Commission, Food and Drug Administration of the top nation, the disease has banned the publication of the Wuhan information, it was said during the workshops to destroy all viral samples or transfer them to some testing institutes, Caixin also reported that other laboratories genome sequences were processed before Zhang received his sample. No published. It ‘hard to know what to draw conclusions. Dr. Dale Fisher, chief of infectious diseases at Singapore National University Hospital says he does not believe that any delay on the part of the Chinese authorities was malignant. “It ‘was more like the check,” he says. Fisher traveled to China as part of a delegation of the World Organization of Health (WHO) at the beginning of February and says epidemics settings are confusing and always uncertain chaotic with people what to believe. “To actually start the whole sequence of the genome in January was great compared to the epidemics of the past.” Of course, they were informed about specific cases Zhang fears based on the viral genome only one decision-making leg-proof China, in addition to public health data and clinical reports. Despite the mounting evidence of human-to-human transmission, including doctors, patients, it was only on January 20 that China has officially confirmed community transmission. Two days later, Wuhan population of 11 million were placed on a bruise blockade that would last for 76 days. publicly praised at WHO China for transparency, internal documents seen by The Associated Press suggested health officials were privately frustrated by the slow release of information. A joint study by scientists in China, the United Kingdom and the United States suggests that it would be 95% fewer cases in China had been introduced earlier three-week block measures. Two weeks before, 86% less; 1 day, 66% less. Read more: ‘I told myself to stay calm’ ends As Wuhan block, call a doctor fighting the Crown to the front but there is some historical basis for skepticism about the severity of the resulting viral disease. Finally, it was 2009, the last global pandemic was the swine flu outbreak less far more deadly than initially feared mainly because many older people have had to carry some immunity against the virus to criticism that WHO quick to explain and even overly dramatic a pandemic if virology not justify. “In China, even though we had an awful experience with SARS and other diseases could be the beginning nobody expected, not even the experts of the Chinese CDC and the Ministry of Health, the disease to be so bad,” says Zhang. Donald Trump is not the agreement. He has repeatedly said that the rapid effect of China has the pandemic might be stopped in its tracks. “The virus came from China,” said Trump August 10 “E ‘blame China.” Beijing admits that mistakes were made in the beginning, but insists that the fault lies exclusively with local authorities bungling (since for these failures are punished), while the reaction of the central government has been exemplary. This, of course, its simplification politically motivated. On both sides of wild accusations have darkened reason that Sino-US. Relations spiral to an unprecedented nadir. While US officials have suggested that COVd-19 were created in a laboratory Wuhan, they have their Chinese colleagues spread conspiracy theories that the US military is in charge. “It is not to be involved in a good thing for China and the United States in this fight,” said Zhang. “If we do not work together, we can solve anything.” Read more: The epidemic Crown could derail Xi Jinping dreams of a Chinese century Some facts must not be denied. The first US case was 21-a in January confirmed a 30-year-old man, who had just returned from Wuhan to his hometown in Washington state. Japan confirmed its first case of Corona the next day and had the highest number of infections around the world in the early onset, before getting a handle on the situation. Today, the United States 16,407 cases per million inhabitants, compared with 462 in Japan. All over the world they have both authoritarian and democratic nations the crisis treated good and evil. For its part, the global scientific community has put the challenge through illness are working across borders to advance the understanding and valuable cooperation between the Chinese and Western virologists. Previously, the best described in terms of epidemic viral genetics in 2014 in West Africa Ebola outbreak. Then, about 1,600 were genomes were mapped more than three years and provides insights into how viruses move from place to place and collect genetic differences in the way they are doing. But for SARS-CoV-2 start, after Zhang mapped genome scientists around 20,000 within three months. Genomic monitoring allows scientists to monitor the speed and nature of genetic mutations that influence rates of infection and the production of vaccines and antiviral drugs. “Very large scale can assess whether there have been resistance mutations, and when they do, how they spread through time genomic screening,” says Oliver Prybus, professor of evolution and infectious diseases at the University of Oxford. For Zhang, now it applies as pathogens appear on understanding and interaction between the environment. Over the last century, an unusually high number of new viral diseases emerged, including the 1956 Asian flu in 2002 and SARS in 2013. H7N9 in China. Zhang different port in China Ecology and huge population. In addition, as China’s economic boom, people started to travel far and wide in search of work, education and opportunities. According to the World Bank, nearly 200 million people covered in urban areas in East Asia in the 21st century in the first decades. In China, 61% of the population lived This unknown pathogens and people with no natural defenses leading around urban areas in 2020, compared to only 18% in 1978 .. “People and pathogens have to be connected [to outbreaks], “says Zhang. “If there is no contact, not a disease.” As urbanization are amplified outbreaks of pathogenic diseases are most common. Mitigation Zhang says, comes from a deeper understanding of the virus to reflect accurately and predict the most likely to cross over into human populations. Just like satellite unfailingly reliable models have weather, Zhang believes, science is key to predicting outbreaks of viruses with an accuracy similar to that which now anticipate typhoons and tornadoes. “If we do not learn lessons from this disease,” said Zhang, “humanity will suffer another.”
Picture of Chen Ronghui copyright for TIME