Coronavirus – natural phenomenon, accident or well-planned bio-terrorist attack?

Wuhan has asked citizens to neither leave nor enter the city without a compelling reason, and all are wearing face masks

• “The Western mass media have discussed the new corona virus that began in the city of Wuhan in Central China but, apart from repetitive small details and the inevitable China-bashing, not much light has been shed on the circumstances. My initial commentary here is composed from a medley of nearly 100 Western news reports, primarily ABC, CBS, CNN, AFP, and from some Chinese media. Officially called the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), the contagion is a respiratory illness, a new type of viral pneumonia, in the same family of infections as SARS and MERS” – Larry Romanoff  

When this article is published, the number of people affected with the virus would probably have exceed 30,000 and the number of deaths more than 700. There is no doubt this virus is spreading and fatalities are increasing.

In a well-researched article, Larry Romanoff, a retired management consultant, businessman and a visiting professor at Shanghai’s Fudan University, seems to pose the possibility that this virus, like SARS, was man-made and designed not to benefit mankind but harm it.

The following part of his article summarises the intent of these potentially man-made viruses. 

“In a thesis on biological weapons, Leonard Horowitz and Zygmunt Dembek stated that one clear sign of a genetically-engineered bio-warfare agent was a disease caused by an uncommon (unusual, rare, or unique) agent, with lack of an epidemiological explanation. i.e. no clear idea of source. They also mentioned an ‘unusual manifestation and/or geographic distribution’, of which race-specificity would be one. Recent disease outbreaks that would seem to possibly qualify as potential bio-warfare agents are AIDS, SARS, MERS, Bird Flu, Swine Flu, Hantavirus, Lyme Disease, West Nile Virus, Ebola, Polio (Syria), Foot and Mouth Disease, the Gulf War Syndrome and Zika. In fact, thousands of prominent scientists, physicians, virologists and epidemiologists on many continents have concurred that all these viruses were lab-created and their release deliberate. The recent swine flu epidemic in China has the hallmarks as well, with circumstantial evidence of the outbreak raising only questions.”1 

While there is no doubt that many researchers are engaged in finding causal reasons for diseases and ways and means of preventing and eliminating them, it appears that like the Dark Web, research is at work behind the scenes on how to eliminate and cause hardship to humankind in a selective manner.

In this instance, as far as the coronavirus is concerned, what one might conclude from Romanoff’s article is that this virus or mutants of it were being developed as bioweapons and were released either deliberately or accidentally. Either way, it appears that the coronavirus was developed as a bioweapon and not as some research tool for the benefit of mankind.

Given the obvious amount of research that has been and is being done, there is some degree of certainty that several countries are probably engaged in developing bioweapons of this nature to launch bio-terrorist attacks.

The reaction to the current outbreak and the consequent economic aftermath for China, as well as for the other countries that benefitted from China’s economic surge, are evident. It is stated that the economic impact to China could be as much as a 1-2%, if not more, drop in their GDP. This would not only affect China badly but several other countries as well, including Sri Lanka.

Although the number of cases affected with the virus is presently 25,000 and the number of fatalities is 500 and of course increasing, in context, this is in a country with a population of nearly 1.4 billion with a mortality rate of around 7.13 per 1000 people which works out to nearly 10 million deaths annually.

While there is no doubt, question or challenge that all necessary precautionary measures need to be taken to halt the spread of the virus, the reaction worldwide appears disproportionate in comparison to deaths that occur and have been occurring globally for decades and longer, with the latest statistics released by the WHO showing worldwide deaths annually from influenza as 290,000-650,000, malaria 1-3 million, TB 1-3 million, and AIDS 770,000. The disease spread from malaria, TB, AIDS, influenza and many other diseases and mortality rates do not make headlines in the news media, as these deaths have been happening for a long time and one more death where a million or more die every year is not news.  

In this instance, as far as the coronavirus is concerned, what one might conclude from Romanoff’s article is that this virus or mutants of it were being developed as bioweapons and were released either deliberately or accidentally. Either way, it appears that the coronavirus was developed as a bioweapon

The aftermath of this reaction to the coronavirus will impact millions of people when the economic consequences set in. China’s GDP is perhaps in excess of $12.3 trillion today (it was $12.27 trillion in 2017). The projected impact to China on account of the forecast drop in GDP (1-2%), would be $122 billion, even if the impact is taken as 1% of the GDP. For Sri Lankans, in context, the country’s total GDP is about $88 billion (it was reported as $87.17 billion in 2017). The impact on countries that have high economic dependency on China will be equally significant, and in some cases acute.

In the context of the statement made by Prime Minister Mahinda Rajapaksa in Parliament on 5 February on the current dire state of the economy in Sri Lanka, the economic hit that China will face will surely aggravate the situation outlined by the Prime Minister. He stated that the economy was growing only at 3%, the lowest in the South Asian region, and warned that the budget deficit could be high as 7%, debt high as 80% of GDP2. 

The result of all this is not just a numbers game, but how it translates to the average household in China and in other countries including Sri Lanka.

Romanoff also makes the point “unusual manifestation and/or geographic distribution”, of which race-specificity would be one”.

The Western media certainly seems to have a penchant for focusing on news in select parts of the world, one of which is China. The fact that this outbreak, like SARS, happened in China and is taking a big economic hit as a consequence surely cannot be lost on strategic thinkers outside the West.  

In his article dated 25 January, Romanoff writes in detail about the many preventive measures that China had taken after the first case was declared on 31 December 2019. All the evidence suggests the Chinese authorities acted effectively as soon as they realised the danger they might be facing. Medical authorities immediately declared the outbreak, and within a week they had identified the pathogen and also determined and shared the genome sequence with the WHO and other parties, a sufficiently speedy response that earned praise from the WHO and scientists around the world.

Remembering the SARS troubles, they did much more. In most large centres in the country, all sports venues, theatres, museums, tourist attractions, and any other locations that attract crowds have been closed, as have all schools. All group tours have been cancelled. Not only the city of Wuhan but virtually the entire province of Hubei has been locked down, with all trains, aircraft, buses, subways and ferries grounded and all major highways and toll booths closed. Thousands of flights and train trips have been cancelled until further notice. Some cities like Shanghai and Beijing are conducting temperature tests on all roadways leading into the cities. In addition, Wuhan is building (in five days) a portable hospital of 25,000 square meters to deal with infected patients. As well, Wuhan has asked citizens to neither leave nor enter the city without a compelling reason, and all are wearing face masks.

While it is the human element that is of prime concern to all concerned, Romanoff’s article touches on some interesting, and also frighteningly concerning possibilities regarding this outbreak.

He starts by saying “While there is no evidence of bio-warfare, a virus outbreak in the city of Wuhan immediately prior to the Chinese New Year migration could potentially have dramatic social and economic repercussions. Wuhan, with a population of about 12 million, is a major transport hub in central China, particularly for the high-speed train network, and with more than 60 air routes with direct flights to most of the world’s major cities, as well as more than 100 internal flights to major Chinese cities. 

“When we add this to the Spring Festival travel rush during which many hundreds of millions of people travel across the country to be with their families, the potential consequences for the entire country are far-reaching.”

What follows in his article accentuates what is frightening. Some key parts are noted here. 

• Comparison with SARS – This is a novel Coronavirus (2019-nCoV), an entirely new strain related to the MERS (MERS-CoV) and the SARS (SARS-CoV) viruses, SARS was proven to be caused by a strain of the coronavirus, a large family of mostly harmless viruses also responsible for the common cold, but SARS exhibited characteristics never before observed in any animal or human virus, did not by any means fully match the animal viruses mentioned above, and contained genetic material that still remains unidentified – similar to this new coronavirus in 2019.
• Virologist Dr. Alan Cantwell had stated that the mysterious SARS was a new virus never before seen by virologists. This was an entirely new illness with devastating effects on the immune system, and there is no known treatment.  Dr. Cantwell also noted that the genetic engineering of coronaviruses has been occurring in both medical and military labs for decades. He wrote that, when he searched in PubMed for the phrase “coronavirus genetic engineering”, he was referred to 107 scientific experiments dating back to 1987. To quote Dr. Cantwell: “I quickly confirmed that scientists have been genetically engineering animal and human coronaviruses to make disease-producing mutant and recombinant viruses for over a decade. No wonder WHO scientists identified the SARS/coronavirus so quickly. Never emphasised by medical news writers is the fact that for over 40 years, scientists have been “jumping species” with all sorts of animal and human viruses and creating chimera viruses (viruses composed from viruses of two different species). This unsupervised research produces dangerous man-made viruses, many of which have potential as bioweapons. Certainly SARS has the hallmarks of a bioweapon.” 
• Almost immediately upon receiving the genome sequence, several Russian scientists suggested a link between SARS and bio-warfare. Sergei Kolesnikov, a member of the Russian Academy of Medical Sciences, said the propagation of the SARS virus might well have been caused by leaking a combat virus grown in bacteriological weapons labs. According to a number of news reports, Kolesnikov claimed that the virus of atypical pneumonia (SARS) was a synthesis of two viruses (of measles and infectious parotiditis or mumps), the natural compound of which was impossible, that this mix could never appear in nature, stating, “This can be done only in a laboratory.” The head of Moscow’s epidemiological services Nikolai Filatov was quoted in the Gazeta daily as stating he believed SARS was man-made because, “there is no vaccine for this virus, its make-up is unclear, it has not been very widespread and the population is not immune to it.”
• The final conclusion of the Chinese biochemists was the same, that the SARS virus was man-made. This conclusion wasn’t a secret, but neither was it promoted to the international media since they would simply have used the claim to heap scorn on China, dismissing this as a paranoid conspiracy theory. The Western media totally ignored this aspect, except for ABC news who reported that the SARS “mystery virus” was possibly “a Chinese bio-weapon that accidentally escaped the laboratory”. 

The following part of Romanoff’s article raises serious concerns about clandestine research activities that seem to be happening. He says, “We might in other circumstances pass this off as an unfortunate coincidence, but for some major circumstantial events that serve to alter our focus.”

One of these is the history of American universities and NGOs having come into China in recent years to conduct biological experiments that were so illegal as to leave the Chinese authorities enraged. This was particularly true when it became known that Harvard University had surreptitiously proceeded with experiments in China that had been forbidden by the authorities’ years earlier, where they collected many hundreds of thousands of Chinese DNA samples and then left the country. The Chinese were furious to learn that Americans were collecting Chinese DNA. The government intervened and prohibited the further export of any of the data. The conclusion at the time was that the ‘research’ had been commissioned by the US military with the DNA samples destined for race-specific bio-weapons research. 

 

The aftermath of this reaction to the coronavirus will impact millions of people when the economic consequences set in. China’s GDP is perhaps in excess of $12.3 trillion today (it was $12.27 trillion in 2017). The projected impact to China on account of the forecast drop in GDP (1-2%), would be $122 billion, even if the impact is taken as 1% of the GDP. For Sri Lankans, in context, the country’s total GDP is about $88 billion (it was reported as $87.17 billion in 2017). The impact on countries that have high economic dependency on China will be equally significant, and in some cases acute

The Western media have already staked out their claim that the virus was transferred to humans from animals or seafood. The media have added fuel to the fire by claiming the virus emerged from “illegally traded wildlife” in a market “where offerings reportedly include wild animals that can carry viruses dangerous to humans”, and that this virus “jumped into the human population from an infected animal”. Chinese officials stated that the virus appears to have originated at a seafood market in Wuhan, though the actual origin has not been determined nor stated by the authorities, and is still an open question perhaps primarily since viruses seldom jump species barriers without human assistance.

The very unfortunate conclusion one can draw from Romanoff’s paper is that bio-weaponry is real and that human beings have the capability and the mindset to carry out the vilest of acts in order to destroy fellow human beings.

While Romanoff does not say there is certainty that this virus spread is deliberate, or even accidental, he does present a background that makes one uncertain that this was a natural phenomenon. The lesson for Sri Lanka is perhaps to ponder whether there is more to this than what meets the eye. 

Another lesson perhaps, is not about who makes which bioweapon, but what might act like a viral bioweapon that causes death and destruction arising from one community being poisoned against another by external elements. The recent Easter Sunday attacks appears to be an attempt by such to cause disharmony, death and destruction, and an attack on the economy of the country. This is not a hypothetical situation, as all these in fact happened. 

The lesson is that Greeks or any other bearing gifts should not be trusted if there is evidence and even suspicion that such gift bearers, in their self-interest, have caused harm and destroyed countries and the amity amongst its people. The Middle East and countries like Iraq and Libya, others like Afghanistan comes to mind. Those who came supposedly to help these countries have left them in absolute chaos.

Notes:

1.https://www.globalresearch.ca/chinas-new-coronavirus-an-examination-of-the-facts/5701662

2.http://www.ft.lk/top-story/PM-gives-reality-check-on-public-finances/26-695179