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Slack / Private Message Drop, p.829 [SLACK_001043] · slack_pm:msg:08641

Date: 2021-05-18 01:23
Type: chat message · slack
recipient: Kristian G. Andersen, Robert F. Garry, Andrew Rambaut
speaker: Edward C. Holmes
Topics: Intelligence community assessments Natural origin / zoonotic spillover

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Ok. 1. Had a chat to a few colleagues in China and the view is that there is nothing special about Wuhan in terms ofthe number and size of the wet markets BUT the city is hugely well connected and is famous for that (it's known asthe River City). You can get there from anywhere in 6 hours on a train. So, people would animals in from all over China to markets in Wuhan, and the animals they sell there are basically a national mix.

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Statement	Grade	Attribution	Stance
Had a chat to a few colleagues in China and the view is that there is nothing special about Wuhan in terms ofthe number and size of the wet markets BUT the city is hugely well connected and is famous for that (it's known asthe River City).	own voice, substantive	speaker_own	asserts

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Had a chat to a few colleagues in China and the view is that there is nothing special about Wuhan in terms ofthe number and size of the wet markets BUT the city is hugely well connected and is famous for that (it's known asthe River City).

own voice, substantive

speaker_own

asserts

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2021-05-18 01:23 Edward C. Holmes

Ok. 1. Had a chat to a few colleagues in China and the view is that there is nothing special about Wuhan in terms ofthe number and size of the wet markets BUT the city is hugely well connected and is famous for that (it's known asthe River City). You can get there from anywhere in 6 hours on a train. So, people would animals in from all over China to markets in Wuhan, and the animals they sell there are basically a national mix.
2021-05-18 01:25 Edward C. Holmes open

2. I asked the journalist on the ground what he know and he sent me this answer. He's a bit all over the place, but what I get from this is whatever as going on within the Wuhan Institute of Virology, what goes outside its highlyregulated doors was probably 100X more risky when it comes to disease emergence.
2021-05-18 01:25 Edward C. Holmes open

"The story on "the boss" of Huanan and the other market is with the Guardian editors. Now working on the one about the zoo/wildlife rescue center/WIV. No one from WIV seems to want to talk about the relationship, so frustrating ...but people don't seem to want to talk about any of this. Can't get anyone from any of these places to talk. Finding outa lot of problematic things though. Just one for instance ... the rescue center had a monkey that became famous forescaping six times over the course of a few years. Terrible biosecurity. I walked along one side of their grounds and there are a couple spots where it would have been easy to get up in a tree and climb over the fence and barbedwire. That Yang Guoxiang who was on the China side of the WHO study team - I've found a few papers of his supporting Asiatic black bear use for bear bile extraction, another on some kind of artificial breeding related to mink. That "wildlife rescue center" also does hybridization experiments according to a Xinhua story I found, with 30 hybridssuccessful, though the only ones it mentioned were ducks.Back to your question ...Huanan didn't seem terribly huge compared to those I've seen in Guangdong. The Four Seasons market is very big, but only part of that devoted to meat/aquatic/poultry. There were no live mammals there when I went but a ladyselling live turtles, who had moved from Huanan, did talk to me for a few minutes until she started blaming the USmilitary for the outbreak ...Have been trying to find out what's happened with the big wildlife market in Qingyuan, Guangdong. This from Peter Li's [HSI] recent book on Animal Welfare in China ..._In 2017, the Conghua market was moved to Qingyuan, 62 miles north of Guangzhou. Like most other wildlife markets, the new market has largely been beyond the reach of Chinese laws. Reported illegal sales have rarely been prosecuted (Yi Weekly 2020; Shanshui Nature Protection Center 2020 B)._It was supposedly "rectified" after Covid hit Wuhan, but not sure what's going on there now. Most of the more illicitstuff at Conghua had been done under the counter or out of vans and trucks near the market. It was rumored to berelocated but ... a report from July last year debunked that: https://xw.qq.com/cmsid/20200722A0Z9IO00http://www.gdqy.gov.cn/xxgk/zzjg/zfjg/qysscjdglj/xxgk/tablyjgk/content/post_1288169.htmlPeter told me that people on the ground in Wuhan were seeing live wildlife at Huanan market for years, so confirms your finding, and up through 2019. Speaking to those people though would be risky to them, so he did not put me incontact.There used to be a huge one in the heart of Guangzhou that I once saw people selling tiger paws outside of but that place has largely been closed down, and I think it prompted the move of most of that stuff to that Conghua place.I may be going back up soon and thinking of stopping at Qingyuan on the way. Going to try to visit several mink farms in Hubei and that one place that has a pangolin license. Calling doesn't work. We've tried."
2021-05-18 01:27 Edward C. Holmes open

3. Did you get this? Professor Sheldon Lee Glashow has a Nobel Prize. [shared file(s): Screen Shot 2021-05-18 at6.26.44 pm.png]
2021-05-18 02:23 Edward C. Holmes open

4. And then I asked the journo to follow the mink:

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