Radio France International reported that, on the next day after Shanghai researchers published the world’s first novel coronavirus genome on the virologic.org website on January 11, the shanghai authorities closed the lab for rectification.
On January 5, Profession Zhang Yongzhen of the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Center and School of Public Health, Fudan University, Shanghai, along with his research team, identified the genome of the coronavirus. They reported it to the National Health Commission and recommended proper measures to prevent it from spreading. However, they did not see any response from the government.
On January 11, Zhang’s team felt that the authorities did not want to take actions to help the public, so they decided to release the virus’ genome. “It is not about one’s fame, but rather facing a respiratory disease that was previously unknown, especially when there will be large-scale population travel during the Chinese New Year period,” a source familiar with Zhang’s team said.
It was said that the Shanghai Health Commission ordered Zhang’s lab to close. The lab is a biosafety level 3 lab (Chinese call it a P3 lab).
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Excerpt in Chinese:
上海公共卫生临床中心和复旦大学公共卫生学院张永贞教授带领的团队，1月11日在virologic.org网站上发布了世上第一个新的冠状病毒基因序列，但当局在翌日却以“整改”的理由关闭该实验室。
张永贞的上海团队在1月5日已经发现了有关的基因排序，并已向国家卫健委报告，还建议当局采取适当的措施防止扩散，但团队等到1月11日仍未见国家当局有任何行动才决定公开基因排序。
南早指出，张的上海团队觉得当局显然无意就病毒一事对社会大众采取任何行动，于是才决定在1月11日公开发表病毒的基因排序。
在那个时候，中国的人民还被告知武汉从1月3日起已经再无新确诊病例，而且没有明显人传人的迹象。
接近张永贞团队的一个消息来源说：“这并非有关任何个人的荣辱，这是面对一种过去未为人所悉的呼吸道疾病，尤其是春运期间有大幅度的人口移动。”
报导指，下令关闭实验室的是上海市健委。
Source: Radio France International, February 29, 2020
http://www.rfi.fr/cn/中国/20200229-上海实验室发表全球首个病毒基因排序翌日突遭当局关闭