Apologies and update added under DYOR. I try to avoid Twit and source the original links in these Substack posts since most sane people stay off that website.
Yes, that is the 2017 bat fly collection GPS logistics showing Institut Pastuer collected fecal samples from Chinese horseshoe bats, but they only published the bat flies.
And you don't collect bat fecal samples to test for bat flies, they (NMRC-A and DoD) were probably looking for coronaviruses (and found them). IP didn't (couldn't) publish the bat sequences until 2021 when they went back and collected the same bat fecal samples with their own money
IP only isolated Banal-236 on the 2nd collection, the one we humans produce antibodies against, but Baric can isolate any virus by just downloading the Banal sequences (presumably uploaded to DoD GEIS in 2017).
Great work and fascinating analysis!
It would be nice, as you usually do, if you cited my original discovery of the USNAMRU/Pasteur trip to that location:
https://x.com/BillyBostickson/status/1438929425047822339
finding confirmed:
https://x.com/babarlelephant/status/1439238959691878402
and the 2016 PREDICT trip
https://x.com/BillyBostickson/status/1438940242942169094
and maybe the 3 locations map created by @tlitb
https://x.com/BillyBostickson/status/1874047537403039987
Apologies and update added under DYOR. I try to avoid Twit and source the original links in these Substack posts since most sane people stay off that website.
Thanks, you have always been good about crediting me, so no worries, and despite our different conclusions.
Definitely suspicious. Found this report from pasteur but they did not even mention coronaviruses .
https://www.pasteur.la/project-carried-on-in-the-lab-14/assessment-of-the-potential-vector-threat-of-bat-borne-pathogens-and-the-host-associated-ectoparasites-in-the-provinces-of-vientiane-and-khammouane-of-the-lao-pdr-batmap-project-extension/
I suspect the 2021 sequences may hv been from 2017 samples. Unlike RaTG13 they actually isolated the virus (so they say)
Yes, that is the 2017 bat fly collection GPS logistics showing Institut Pastuer collected fecal samples from Chinese horseshoe bats, but they only published the bat flies.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6856264/
And you don't collect bat fecal samples to test for bat flies, they (NMRC-A and DoD) were probably looking for coronaviruses (and found them). IP didn't (couldn't) publish the bat sequences until 2021 when they went back and collected the same bat fecal samples with their own money
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-022-04532-4
IP only isolated Banal-236 on the 2nd collection, the one we humans produce antibodies against, but Baric can isolate any virus by just downloading the Banal sequences (presumably uploaded to DoD GEIS in 2017).
https://www.health.mil/Military-Health-Topics/Health-Readiness/AFHSD/Global-Emerging-Infections-Surveillance-and-Response