This undated handout photo by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases of the US National Institutes of Health, obtained on Aug 1, 2021, shows a transmission electron color-enhanced micrograph of SARS-CoV-2 virus particles isolated from a patient. (NATIONAL INSTITUTES OF HEALTH / NATIONAL INSTITUTE OF ALLERGY AND INFECTIOUS DISEASES / AFP)
MOSCOW – A new French study has dismissed a cave in Mojiang county, southwest China's Yunnan province as an origin of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19.
The study, published online on the journal Environmental Research in late September, also rebuts lab-leak speculations that link the virus to several miners working in the county in 2012
The study, published online on the journal Environmental Research in late September, also rebuts lab-leak speculations that link the virus to several miners working in the county in 2012.
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A retrospective analysis of their clinical reports showed that the miners had displayed symptoms very different from those shown by COVID-19 patients, Sputnik news agency reported.
"One must also wonder why a virus which killed more than 5 million and infected more than 200 million in 18 months did not cause any illness in 7 years from 2012 to 2019," the study read.
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"Dismissing the Mojiang mine theory leaves the laboratory leak narrative without any scientific support thus making it simply an opinion-based narrative," it added.