Ex-head of MI6 Sir Richard Dearlove says coronavirus ‘is man-made’ and was ‘released by accident’ – after seeing ‘important’ scientific report
- Ex-MI6 chief Sir Richard Dearlove said he believes that Covid-19 is man-made
- He cited an ‘important’ report which claims virus was manufactured in a lab
- Believes China could be forced to pay ‘reparations’ to the rest of the world
- Here’s how to help people impacted by Covid-19
The former chief of MI6 has claimed that the coronavirus escaped from a lab in China by accident.
Sir Richard Dearlove, who was head of the MI6, a role known informally as ‘C’, from 1999 until 2004, said he believes that Covid-19 is man-made.
He cited an ‘important’ report from Professor Angus Dalgleish of St George’s Hospital, University of London and Norwegian virologist Birger Sorensen which claims the virus was manufactured in a laboratory.
In the report, scientists claimed to have identified ‘inserted sections placed on the Sars-CoV-2 Spike surface’ which the virus uses to attach onto cells and observed they were ‘significantly different from any Sars we have studied’.
Sir Richard Dearlove (pictured), who was head of the MI6, a role known informally as ‘C’, from 1999 until 2004, said he believes that Covid-19 is man-made
He cited an ‘important’ report from Professor Angus Dalgleish of St George’s Hospital, University of London and Norwegian virologist Birger Sorensen which claims the virus was manufactured in a laboratory. Above, researchers in a lab at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan in central China’s Hubei province
The Wuhan Institute of Virology in Wuhan in China’s central Hubei province pictured above
Sir Richard added that the report’s findings could force China to pay ‘reparations’ to the rest of the world due to the damage wrought by the virus.
‘I do not think that this started as an accident,’ Sir Richard told The Telegraph’s Planet Normal podcast.
‘It raises the issue, if China ever were to admit responsibility, does it pay reparations?
‘I think it will make every country in the world rethink how it treats its relationship with China.’
Bat soup (pictured) is a delicacy in China. A previous investigation by the World Health Organisation (WHO) found that the virus jumped from bats to humans at the Wuhan wet market where wild animals are kept in cages and slaughtered for meat
The research claimed that current efforts to find a vaccine would prove unsuccessful as scientists have so far misunderstood the true properties of Covid-19.
Sir Richard suggested that the scientists at a laboratory in Wuhan could have secretly been carrying out experiments on bat coronaviruses when Covid-19 somehow accidentally escaped through a lapse in biosecurity.
According to the former MI6 chief, the paper had been rewritten several times, and an earlier version apparently claimed coronavirus could accurately be called the ‘Wuhan virus’.
The Wuhan Institute of Virology (pictured) is a biosecurity level four laboratory which researched bat coronaviruses not far from the wet market
An earlier version of the report, seen by the Telegraph, reportedly claimed ‘beyond all reasonable doubt that the Covid-19 virus is engineered.’
A previous investigation by the World Health Organisation (WHO) found that the virus jumped from bats to humans at the Wuhan wet market where wild animals are kept in cages and slaughtered for meat.
The wet market is located not far from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the only level four biosecurity laboratory lab in China.
Yet late last month a Chinese official admitted no viruses were detected in animal samples.
‘At first, we assumed the seafood market might have the virus, but now the market is more like a victim,’ said Gao Fu, director of the Centre for Disease Control and Prevention.