I just don’t think this is deliberate.
I am able to be convinced otherwise, so not set in concrete.
But I’ve known people who did dumbass ‘you did what?!, why?!!!’ things for no better reason than ‘just wanted to see if it could be done’. Fortunately we have a lot of UV lights in labs and did even then.
If you question the ‘just because we can, lets!’ attitude you’re decried as a luddite. ‘someone else will do it and publish it first!’.
And then it walked out of their lab on a shoelace. Or animal sold at market...or...
My own personal theory is that someone was doing research that SHOULD have been in a level 4 lab but those were all signed up for months in advance. Since politicos in China are probably the ones directing the lab on ‘political’ endpoints the hapless researcher tried to use a level 3 lab and ‘just be really careful’. And here we are.
I’m on record that putting human genes in the big apes is a really bad idea. Didn’t they watch that movie!?
That is very close to what happened. Infected lab animals which were ordered disposed of were instead covertly sold to a local exotic animals meat market.