CORONAVIRUS ORIGIN TRACED TO WUHAN WILD LIFE MARKET AS CHINESE GOVERNMENT'S COVER UP EFFORTS ARE EXPOSED

Shi Zhengli is a virologist known as China's 'BATWOWAN"

China is accused of hiding the findings of a coronavirus expert - known as "Bat Woman" - after she quickly identified the genetic make-up of the new strain that has infected millions.

Wuhan-based virologist Shi Zhengli is one of the world's top researchers on coronaviruses and has discovered dozens of deadly SARS-like viruses in bat caves.

Shi Zhengli has discovered dozens of deadly SARS-like viruses in bat caves (file photo)

She studied samples taken from some of the first people to become infected with the new and then-mysterious respiratory illness in China in December and found it was similar to SARS.

It was identified as a novel coronavirus and within three days she completed its gene sequencing, but she was "muzzled" and researchers were ordered not to reveal any information about the new disease.

A police officer stands guard outside of Huanan wildlife market in Wuhan in January

The claims are the latest to emerge after a cover-up by Chinese authorities who failed to share information or issue warnings early on and, ultimately, contain a virus that emerged in Wuhan and then spread around the world, leading to tens of thousands of deaths and more than a million confirmed infections.

Chinese journalist Gao Yu said he spoke to Shi during his incarceration in Wuhan, which was locked down for more than two months, and she told him her findings were hushed up, the Mail on Sunday reported.

The journalist added: "We learned later her institute finished gene-sequencing and related tests as early as January 2 but was muzzled."

The information wasn't made public until a week later.

The day that the genetic information was mapped, Yanyi Wang, director of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, ordered staff not to reveal any information about the disease, it is claimed.

Scientistts at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where the new coronavirus was studied

After local doctors were detained for warning locals about the virus, the director claimed "inappropriate and inaccurate information" was causing "general panic".

She ordered staff not to post any information on social media or speak to the media.

Just over a week later, a team in Shanghai published a sequence on an open access platform after studying samples from an infected patient.

Their laboratory was shut for "rectification" two days later.

One of the earliest Covid-19 cases emerged in mid-December when a patient, who worked at a wildlife market in Wuhan that became the early epicentre of the outbreak, was hospitalised with a double lung infection in the city in central China.

The usual treatment for flu-like illness failed to work and new cases soon emerged.

On December 27, Wuhan health officials were told that the illness was being caused by a new coronavirus.

Three days later, at least two doctors from Wuhan - Li Wenliang and Ai Fen - shared information about the new virus on the social network WeChat.

Li, a whistleblower who was warned by police to stop "making false comments", died in February after contracting the virus.

Ai is missing after giving media interviews criticising China's censorship and hospital authorities for suppressing early warnings of the outbreak.

She told the Chinese magazine, Renwu, or People, that she was reprimanded after alerting her bosses and colleagues of the new virus in December.

On 30 December, she received the laboratory results of one case which stated: "SARS coronavirus".

The next day, Wuhan officials confirmed almost 30 cases, shut down the wildlife market and notified the World Health Organisation's local office about the mysterious illness.

New cases continued to emerge and the outbreak was spreading outside of China, but for a week in January health officials in Wuhan insisted they had not received any new patients.

During that time, the first known case outside of China was detected in Thailand and a case was reported in the US as infected people left Wuhan and surrounding Hubei province to travel across the country and around the world.

Chinese authorities insisted they hadn't seen any "clear evidence" that the virus could be spread from human to human. 

By then they had lost control and hospitals were becoming overwhelmed by the rising number of infected patients.

Within days Dr Zhong Nanshan, the country's top respiratory expert and the face of its containment effort, revealed that human transmission was taking place.

Wuhan and several other cities struggling to contain the virus went into lockdown on January 23, days before the Lunar New Year holiday, but by then millions of people had left without being screened.

In the following weeks, the virus rapidly spread to other countries via imported cases and community transmission.

Meanwhile, life is slowly starting to return to normal in Wuhan after its lockdown was lifted after more than 70 days.

China is now stepping up screening of inbound foreigners and tightening border control after the number of single-day imported coronavirus cases set a record, helping double the daily number of newly detected infections.

New confirmed cases in mainland China reached 99 on Saturday from 46 the previous day, with all but two involving travellers from abroad.

In Shanghai, 51 Chinese nationals flying in on the same flight from Russia tested positive.

"The risk of imported cases has increased dramatically," Wen Guohui, mayor of Guangzhou, an economic hub in Southern China, told a news conference.

Guangzhou is enforcing anti-virus measures on anyone who enters the city from across the national border, regardless of nationality, race or gender, foreign affairs official Liu Baochun said at the same event.

"We hope foreigners can strictly abide by anti-virus rules as Chinese do," he said.

The north-eastern city of Harbin will implement a 28-day quarantine measure for all arrivals from abroad, its government announced.

People entering the capital of Heilongjiang province bordering Russia will be held at a quarantine center for 14 days at first, followed by another 14 days at home, it added.

They will also be subjected to two nucleic acid tests and an antibody test.

The government will also lock down for 14 days residential units in which confirmed and asymptomatic coronavirus cases are found, it added.

The city of Suifenhe, also on the border with Russia, said it was strengthening controls as part of measures to prevent imported cases.

It has banned all types of gatherings and drawn up a list of businesses that must be suspended from operations.

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