Shocking photos inside Wuhan lab show broken seal on unit storing 1,500 virus strains including bat coronavirus
SHOCKING photos from a Wuhan lab show a broken seal on a store containing 1,500 virus strains - including the bat coronavirus linked to the devastating pandemic.
The startling images from the city where the virus broke out were published by the state-owned China Daily on Twitter last month before being swiftly deleted.
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They had been released first in 2018 before re-emerging and causing concern over how the virus came to spread all over the world.
The picture of the fridge-freezer shows a flimsy loose seal on the door, as a lab worker pulls out a chilled box containing deadly samples while wearing gloves and a mask.
It was revealed earlier this month minister fear the deadly pandemic could have started after a leak from a lab.
US and British intelligence officials suspect bungling scientists at the Wuhan Institute of Virology accidentally spread the killer during risky coronavirus tests on bats.
In January 2018, the US Embassy in Beijing sent two official warnings back to Washington highlighting inadequate safety measures at the Wuhan lab where scientists conducted dangerous research on coronavirus from bats, The Washington Post reported.
They warned about safety and management weaknesses at the lab and proposed more international assistance as the Chinese had turned down help to prove their ability to work independently.
Patient Zero, the first person to contract Covid-19, was an intern there who infected her boyfriend, it was being claimed.
President Donald Trump said the US was trying to establish if coronavirus first crossed to humans during the bat tests.
Secretary of State Mike Pompeo pointed out that the WIV was “just a handful of miles” from the live animal market which Chinese officials rushed to pinpoint as the source of the outbreak.
Officials at the Wuhan lab have previously dismissed allegations that coronavirus came from their facility and have called them baseless conspiracy theories.
Scientists have said that genetic evidence indicates the virus was not artificially engineered and it had likely originated in bats.
However, the genetic data cannot indicate exactly where and how the virus first crossed to humans.
President Xi Jinping warned the public about the virus on January 20 — when more than 3,000 people had been infected during almost a week of public silence.
During the six days the world was unaware of the virus, the city of Wuhan — the epicentre of the global outbreak — hosted a mass banquet for tens of thousands of people, and millions began to travel through for Lunar New Year celebrations.
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On March 11, the virus was by the World Health Organization.
Other reports have also emerged alleging China attempted to cover up its role in the extent of the pandemic by silencing whistleblowers and muzzling scientists, while concerned doctors have disappeared.
2.3million people have been infected with the killer bug since the outbreak at the start of the year.
Countries have shut down and cities become ghost towns as the world tries to tackle the virus spread.
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While most recover, at least 155,000 have died, according to a tally by Johns Hopkins University based on figures supplied by health authorities around the globe.
China reported 16 new cases and no deaths in the 24 hours through midnight Saturday.
That raised the official fatality toll to 4,632 some three-quarters of them in the central city of Wuhan, where the virus emerged among 82,735 confirmed cases.
