Chat message

Slack / Private Message Drop, p.484 [SLACK_000698] · slack_pm:msg:05042

Date: 2021-02-05 12:30
Type: chat message · slack
recipient: Kristian G. Andersen, Robert F. Garry, Andrew Rambaut
speaker: Edward C. Holmes
Topics: Media strategy and public messaging China relations and data access Furin cleavage site and molecular features

Recipients on this medium are inferred from channel membership, not per-message addressing.

The sequence was submitted to GenBank on the 5th - the day it was sequenced - before the paper was written. The embargo is a standard - hold until publication clause. The data was sent to the Ministry of Health on that day. Zhang also told them that it was a human respiratory pathogen. I wanted to release the sequence on that day as well butwe could not because China had imposed a gag order on the 3rd. We submitted the paper on the 7th. We very quickly heard from a reviewer that they thought it was a good idea to release the sequence as did the editor. I was trying to get Zhang to do it but he was under pressure. After Jeremy's tweet I contacted Jeremy and told him the story, although I think he was really referring to George. He said it had to be released by the Monday. So, I tried again with Zhang and he agreed. The GenBank sequence was released on the 12th. He did put his neck on the line and he did get into serious trouble. Things got so bad that I told him a few times that we should just withdraw the paper just to save him. There's nothing new here and I've explained this - including Jeremy's tweet - to get press many times. If she wants to moan it should be to the China CDC who had the data earlier and did nothing.

Extracted statements

Rule-extracted, not adjudicated. The grade says what may be done with each one; read the document above before relying on any of them.

Statement	Grade	Attribution	Stance
The embargo is a standard - hold until publication clause.	needs context	speaker_own	asserts
If she wants to moan it should be to the China CDC who had the data earlier and did nothing.	quoted / not their view	hypothetical conditional framing	asserts

Statement

Grade

Attribution

Stance

The embargo is a standard - hold until publication clause.

needs context

speaker_own

asserts

If she wants to moan it should be to the China CDC who had the data earlier and did nothing.

quoted / not their view

hypothetical conditional framing

asserts

In context

A single line often inverts meaning once you see what it answers, so neighbouring messages are always shown.

2021-02-05 12:27 Kristian G. Andersen open

@Andrew Rambaut - do you happen to have some good curated ccCoV genomic datasets?
2021-02-05 12:28 Kristian G. Andersen open

I'm getting a lot of "have we reached peak fitness" (I doubt it) questions, so I'd like to get a sense of where weactually are in the cc world. I assume "peak fitness" is dominated by a bunch of local maxima - not a single big hill toclimb.
2021-02-05 12:30 Edward C. Holmes

The sequence was submitted to GenBank on the 5th - the day it was sequenced - before the paper was written. The embargo is a standard - hold until publication clause. The data was sent to the Ministry of Health on that day. Zhang also told them that it was a human respiratory pathogen. I wanted to release the sequence on that day as well butwe could not because China had imposed a gag order on the 3rd. We submitted the paper on the 7th. We very quickly heard from a reviewer that they thought it was a good idea to release the sequence as did the editor. I was trying to get Zhang to do it but he was under pressure. After Jeremy's tweet I contacted Jeremy and told him the story, although I think he was really referring to George. He said it had to be released by the Monday. So, I tried again with Zhang and he agreed. The GenBank sequence was released on the 12th. He did put his neck on the line and he did get into serious trouble. Things got so bad that I told him a few times that we should just withdraw the paper just to save him. There's nothing new here and I've explained this - including Jeremy's tweet - to get press many times. If she wants to moan it should be to the China CDC who had the data earlier and did nothing.
2021-02-05 12:33 Robert F. Garry open

Thank Eddie - And, of course, Virological release was earlier than GenBank.
2021-02-05 12:33 Andrew Rambaut open

And Gisaid despite what Bogner claims.
2021-02-05 12:34 Robert F. Garry open

A little while back I think we discussed that Ct values for G614 are lower than for D614. B117 still lower, but does anyone have Ct data for B.1.351 and P.1?
2021-02-05 12:44 Edward C. Holmes open

Exactly. Virological seemed the best way to get it out and Andrew and I had discussed that option already. The GISAID option never crossed my mind. To me, the key thing is that Zhang told the Ministry of Health exactly what itis was on the 5th, that it was likely a human respiratory pathogen, and that people should take precautions. That was the key info. But 100s of health care workers were infected by the time they finally admitted human-to-human transmission some weeks later. That's the true scandal.

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