Former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Robert Redfield penned an opinion editorial this week calling for a global moratorium on gain-of-function research.
In an opinion piece for the Wall Street Journal , Redfield and Dr. Marc Siegel of NYU Langone Health argued that until lawmakers can conduct a “comprehensive bipartisan investigation into the origin of Covid-19,” every lab around the world needs to pause its gain-of-function research “while authorities develop a clear and careful policy to help prevent the next pandemic.”
Redfield noted that COVID-19 has the properties that “allow its spike protein to change its orientation and dock more easily with a human cell” and until authorities can verify what role the Wuhan lab played in the virus’s spread, investigation must continue.
Gain-of-function research involves scientists extracting viruses from the wild and engineering them to infect humans in order to study potential therapeutics including vaccines. In 2012, Dr. Anthony […]
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