no—one bbc news, what triggered the global health pandemic? what happened at the what happened at the start what happened at the start of what happened at the start of the pandemic? where did this virus come from? how did we get on the situation? this is a million—dollar question. almost two years since the first cases were reported, we still don't know how, exactly where, and when the pandemic started. at least three of the four seasonal coronavirus is really originated from the animal world. the theory about possible lab incident in the cases appear to have emerged is being taken more seriously. we must not discount things that have a 5% probability or 1% probability for something as important as this. it couldn't happen through a lab accident, loudly, because where — lab accident, loudly, because where it_ lab accident, loudly, because where it occurred, close to this — where it occurred, close to this institute. where it occurred as denied, you need _ where it occurred as denied, you need evidence. - you need evidence. i have _ you need evidence. i have reported - you need evidence. i have reported onl you need evidence. - i have reported on many outbreaks of new diseases including gaza 19 distant cousin in saudi arabia. there are always politics, but the blame game is now severely impacting the sites. it was china's bold, and they will pay a big price. scapegoating cannot whitewash the us — scapegoating cannot whitewash the us. we scapegoating cannot whitewash the us. ~ ., ., the us. we travelled to rotterdam _ the us. we travelled to rotterdam to _ the us. we travelled to rotterdam to meet - the us. we travelled to j rotterdam to meet one the us. we travelled to i rotterdam to meet one of the us. we travelled to - rotterdam to meet one of the scientist who was on at the who organised mission to wuhan to study the origins of the pandemic. the more we argue about the politics, the slower the science takes to get done. 0ne science takes to get done. one in 11.5 million people have one in 4.5 million people have died _ one in 4.5 million people have died from _ one in 4.5 million people have died from this virus. we owe them — died from this virus. we owe them and _ died from this virus. we owe them and their families answers. iama i am a professor of urology, i have been part of the origin mission international team because of my expertise on viruses, and virus transmission studies. i have read about pandemics, study them. i have worked in this field for 30 years. it has been hard, work has been crazy, pressure on my loved ones, like everyone has been crazy. being part of these types of discussions comes at a price. not everyone is happy with the positions of the site on this. you have had physical violent threats? oh, yes. nine months ago the professor flew to the first epicentre of the outbreak with other international experts to try to find out how the pandemic began. wuhan city, home to 11 million people and the most populated city in central china. it prides itself on being an international hub for science and the. it is also home to a number of traditional chinese wet markets, including the seafood market where the first cluster of covid cases seemed to have emerged. the professors visited the market and believe it could be where the virus jumped from animals and humans. to me, just looking at the market and the layout of the market, with many different stalls, with many different types of animals sold there, some of them live and imported from parts of china where we know that if the bat populations are most prevalent, and have most of these stars related viruses. where are you on the origins of this virus? well, they most likely is that it is bats and i think we may need to think about an intermediary animal to explain how it actually got into people. and what evidence are you basing that on? first of all, the genetic evidence. there is one very close relative of it. ratg-13 that was found in bats in china in 2013 after six miners got sick. three of them died. researchers from wuhan and officially identified the virus. it is a 96.2% match with sars—cov—2 and closer relatives have been found in bat caves in neighbouring caves in the past few weeks. this is significant because both are the closest known relatives of sars—cov—2 and either, or both, could have changed enough over the past few decades to be able tojump into humans, probably through an intermediate animal. scientists have pointed to a few prime suspects, including pangolins, mink and raccoon dogs. understanding genetically very similar viruses can help scientists come up with a timeline for when and possibly where sars—cov—2 may have spilled over from animals. there is also the fact this has happened a number of times before, most notably with the stars outbreak in china in 2003, and middle east respiratory syndrome whichjumped into camels and then humans in saudi arabia. we have seen similar events spill over events, but there also molecular evidence from information studies that at least three of the four seasonal coronaviruses, if not all of them, really originated from the animal world. so there is really a track record of coronaviruses doing this, so that is why i think it is really still the most likely explanation. my name is dominic dwyer. i am a medical virologist and infectious diseases specialist. and i have worked in public health virology for many years. professor dwyer agrees that all the current evidence points to a natural animal spill—over. wild animals and farmed animals were for sale in the markets in wuhan before the outbreak. so all of these piece by piece lean towards the animal hypothesis. but it's important to remember that you don't necessarily get a single piece of definitive evidence. it really is often about building block by block to get there. almost all of the scientist i have been in touch with agreed that based on the evidence available so far, an animal spill—over is the most likely cause of the pandemic. but questions also remain over whether that spill—over may have happened by accident at a world leading coronavirus research centre that happens to be in wuhan. in 2003, china was hit by the deadly sars outbreak caused by the sars—cov—1. it spread to four countries. it killed hundred people. since then the wuhan institute of virology had been studying similar coronaviruses, trying to ensure the country was prepared for the next deadly outbreak. the research centre is around 14 kilometres from the seafood market where it is thought some of the first cases of covid emerged. and for some that is just too much of a coincidence. we don't have certainty. china's secrecy, deceptions and cover—up allowed it to spread all over the world. the trump administration led the charge against china, blaming its leaders and pushing the laboratory leak theory without providing any evidence. for a while that hypothesis was put firmly in the realms of conspiracy theory. but some scientists quietly wondered whether under all the inflammatory and at times racist language, the trump administration may be onto something. if you have a laboratory related incident... aligned with being a trump, he radicalised the whole thing. that is the problem. people couldn't really speak out in any kind of support of that view or parts of that view because of being aligned with his ideology. i am a professor at the university of edinburgh medical school. looking at the pieces of evidence we have already in trying to connect the dots, it looks like it was not bioengineered. it was a natural origin but it could have happened through a laboratory accident, a laboratory leak, as you say, because when it emerged so close to the wuhan institute of virology, which is a level four laboratory, the highest level of experiments with dangerous viruses to humans, and also because we have not had a full audit in transparency from the chinese government, nor found an intermediary animal host that would explain the virus. questions have also been raised about what exactly type of research was going on at the wuhan institute of virology, which had received some funding from the us. there have been claims scientist may have been carrying out controversial studies where viruses are manipulated and potentially made more contagious. yes, i believe those experiments were going on because that is what we found out and try to understand viruses. china has called these claims pure lies. the spill—over is probably more likely but there is a significant possibility nonetheless that the lab was involved in some way, shape orform. the international scientists on the joint who mission said they did ask their chinese counterparts whether these experiments were happening and whether any of the staff at the institute may have accidentally become infected. we didn't hear any evidence of infection in the workers in the laboratory. we didn't hear any evidence of culturing sars—cov—z in that laboratory before the outbreak happened. again with the laboratory leak, if there was evidence to follow, that would be great, let's go down that pathway. if the us agencies had come with more information, terrific, let's get on with it and try to assist them. but in terms of taking it further, you then need evidence to go further. but in terms of taking it further, you then need evidence to go further. 0n the 9th of february 2020, thejoint who china mission reported its findings to the world. it concluded that a spill—over from an infected animal was the most likely triggerfor the pandemic, followed by the possibility that frozen food came from another country into china, contaminated, and then a laboratory incident was at the bottom of the list of hypotheses, described as extremely unlikely. what we were hearing as a result of the investigation was that this was definitely not a laboratory related incident. that is how it was interpreted. we've got to remember full access was not granted to the team to laboratory records. and thatjust raises some questions as to why the laboratory involvement was rated as extremely unlikely. i think that is over calling it. i think it is less likely, not extremely unlikely. professor gupta was one of 18 international scientists who publicly criticised the results of the joint mission, calling for a proper investigation which should be transparent, objective, data driven and are subject to independent oversight. the who itself also had concerns about the experts�*s findings. privately it criticised the report for not providing specific evidence forcing the laboratory incident theory was extremely unlikely. out of the four hypotheses they looked at, some are more or less likely. this doctor and infectious diseases expert. what i know is that international team of amazing scientists, from all over the world, went into better understand it better. they had a mandate to study and to learn from the chinese counterparts what they were willing to share with them. and then you see the report that was out. they reported is several hundred pages long and has a lot of information on the molecular and the animals' susceptibility, and very little on the laboratory. it wasn't a mandate to begin with to cover that in full. dating didn't have the full capacity is to do laboratory audits. they did in there and they made their assessments. clearly, there is much more work that needs to be done for the laboratory hypotheses. do you sort of stand by your extremely unlikely categorisation? do i stand by it? yeah. i still think... so, obviously the exact wording has gone viral. so, had we known that, then maybe that exact wording would have been a little bit more careful. just unlikely as opposed to extremely? maybe. if that would take the sting out, yes. i would not mind saying that. both professors told me they would welcome new investigations into the laboratory leak theory if credible evidence was presented. so far, they say, they have seen is speculation. but the world health organization lead on thatjoint mission to wuhan seems to raise some questions over how a laboratory leak theory could be defined. he presented a scenario to danish tv where it could be possible for a lab worker to accidentally become infected and trigger an outbreak. we asked the who for an interview but the agency declined. my name is david hayman and i am a professor of infectious disease epidemiology at the london school of hygiene and tropical medicine. there have been several laboratory accidents of these very lethal pathogens in the past. the last cases of sars coronavirus in 2003 had the origin in laboratory accidents in singapore, in taiwan and in china. so, laboratory accidents do occur, despite very rigorous measures to try to prevent them from happening. so this is not as, in the conspiracy relms, as perhaps it was made out at the very beginning? what's most important to understand is that laboratory accidents can occur. whatever is being manipulated in that laboratory could leave the laboratory when a person becomes infected, or through some kind of waste material coming out of the laboratory. this pandemic has killed at least 4.9 million people. it has turned our lives as we knew them upside down. health systems have been overwhelmed. and families forced to stay apart. there is always politics and blame games in new disease outbreaks, but there are concerns that the massive impact of covid and the geopolitical infighting is severely hindering the science. china still has not shared some of the key data from the earliest days of the pandemic, including information about the very first suspected cases. from the start its leaders have tried to control the information coming out. what is it like going into these countries? no country wants to be investigated in this way, they want their own people to do it. research, taking specimens and running. what has to be done is you have to go into a country, work with the country and together come up with hypotheses and conclusions. and remember countries can make their own decisions. there is a difficulty there if the sovereign country wants to shape what the science says. it can be very frustrating. to do an investigation to understand the source and not be able to talk about that. governments try to cover up outbreaks because nobby wants ——governments try to cover up outbreaks because nobody wants to be responsible for this and to be in somewhere blame for this, especially when there is an outpouring of anger. what you see is people saying, who caused covid? it is always over there, it is always them, nobody wants to take the responsibility. in some way i think this might have backfired on the chinese because instead of actually getting more trust in more cooperation, it seems to have led to more scrutiny and more scepticism over, what are you hiding if you are not willing to be more transparent? the who is the un agency the world turns to during international health emergencies but it can't force its member countries to share information. it has been accused of being too close to china, especially in the early days of the pandemic. this is all politics. the who is a political organisation. its membership relies and its funds rely on governments funding it, essentially, so therefore it is politicised. so what is the answer? how do you get to the truth? i'm not sure we ever will, actually. we just have to realise that we don't know. that is the thing. they should be questions of what happened here. i'm not sure we are going to get any further information. that dutch tv interview with the who joint studies international lead, also raised questions around whether the international team were pressured into presenting the laboratory leak theory as extremely unlikely, suggesting that this was the only way it was allowed to be featured in the final report. translation: 48 hours before | we were done with the mission, we still hadn't agreed on whether to mention the laboratory in the report. my counterpart and i went out into the hallway and discussed how to resolve the impasse, so we could move on. that is when i said we had to include it or we don't have a report. he agreed that we could mention it in the report on the condition that we wouldn't recommend specific studies on that hypotheses, we would just leave it there. he basically suggested that, yes, there was pressure, and that is why it was characterised in that way and if it hadn't been written and is extremely unlikely, or there is no further investigation needed, then it can appear on that report at all. we made it clear that the laboratory hypotheses is not off the table butjust out of the different ways this pandemic could have started, yeah, that it is on the bottom of our list. do you think the chinese scientist at pressure put on them from that perspective? that is quite likely because as you say, all sars research has been put under a national committee. of course, it is difficult to know exactly who knows what and controls what, but it is clear that there is a chain of command there but, having said that, it was a good group of scientists. i think there is a question of why do we need to know this and how do we move forward? politically, there are huge ramifications for the consequences. i'm less interested in that and more interested in preventing scientifically something of this happening again. if there was a laboratory leak, how do we have better procedures? if it was a natural origin, we have to look at where it was, was it farming? was it keeping animals close together? how do we regulate that so we don't have the next virus emerging? the who has toughened its stance on china, again calling for the country to share crucial data from some of the earliest suspected cases of covid. and it's been more explicit about the need for investigations into a possible laboratory incident. we are asking actually china to be transparent, open and cooperate. and we need information, direct information, on what the situation of these laboratories were before. and at the start of the pandemic. chinese officials did not agree to do an interview with us but they did sent us a statement which said china has always supported and will continue participating in science—based origins tracing. it added, a few politicians in the us and some other western countries are spreading lies that have no foundation in science. it said they are doing this to distract public attention from their own botched responses to the pandemic. and they describe it as pure political manipulation. in amongst all the political backbiting, the un agency says it is trying to bring it all back to the science. its solution? saonp — the scientific for the origins of novel pathogens. what this scientific advisory will do will set up a framework to articulate what needs to be done each and every time there is an emergence, or re—emergence, one of these high threat pathogens, so there is a standardised approach each time when this happens because, unfortunately, it will happen again. the who has named the team of 26 scientists from 26 different countries which will make up the body and at the top of their priorities is finding the origins of the covid—19 pandemic. it is exceptionally important that we try to understand the origins of a virus that's — we have nearly a quarter of a billion confirmed cases around the world. it is likely to be a hell of a lot more. that is a human endeavour to understand a virus that has stopped our whole world. and i would ask everyone, countries, journalists, and everybody else, to create a little space for that discussion to happen, because this is probably, right now, this is our best chance and it may be our last chance. the professor is one of the selected 26 experts and will once again take on this mammoth task. i think it's critical that we all realise that there are many different places in the world where things like this could happen. so, let's step away from accusations and move towards trying to collaborate, to really figure out what happened. the world can get more of these kinds of outbreaks and we really need to figure out how to prevent them. we have the political will, we have the public's attention, we have financing, we have the scientists coming to the table to make us better, to make all of us be better prepared as we go forward. this is a catalytic moment. the clock is certainly ticking. i am hopeful that we'll get closer to an understanding of the origins of this virus. whether or not we find exact origins remains an open question. hello. saturday improved to some sunny spells and isolated showers and areas have seen some pretty miserable weather recently including borders and it was better today with quinces and sunshine around. similar story today. sunday will start off pretty wet across areas with significant area of low pressure into the southern flank of batlow and likely gale—force winds and that may act as a friend in some respects and that will push the heavy early rain quickly northwards and it will linger across the far north of scotland but an improvement as we go through the morning and into the afternoon with a frequent cluster of showers. gusts of wind inland close to 30mph, but those on the coast up to 50mph at times. the weather, 10—13 degrees in scotland and northern ireland, 13, 14 further south. moving out of sunday into start of monday and the start of a new month, the low pressure will drift off into scandinavia and the wind direction wall swing north—westerly, a cooler source and that will dry the warmer yellow turns back to the continent, the caller pushing across the uk meaning temperatures in the first few days of november could be just a little bit underfor this time of year. we start off monday on a chilly note first thing when we have a clear skies and a frequent rash of showers driven along by the brisk north—westerly wind, pushed further south as we go through the afternoon. temperatures just 8—10 degrees into the north and may be a maximum of 12 or 13 further south. the middle part of the week, that north—westerly flow is likely to stay with us and we see the ridge of high pressure trying to build in from the atlantic, and it is likely to kill off some of the showers but it does mean that we are going to stay on the cool side for this time of year. it also means we could see more in the way of overnight frost and we have not seen much significant frost so far this season but it means that overall things will stay dry and quieter but on the cool side as we go through the week ahead. take care. hello, you're watching bbc news. i'm rich preston. our top stories: covid, climate change and iran. pressing issues being hammered out by world leaders at the g20 summit in rome. also in rome, the british minister borisjohnson warns the eu that french threats over post—brexit fishing licenses are completely unjustified. we're going to get on and do the things that matter to both of and make sure that we work together on tackling the big issues that face the world. three people are killed in sudan as thousands take to the streets to protest against the military coup. and polls open in japan, the governing liberal—democratic party hoping to maintain their grip on power.

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