Nope. Bioengineered.
I think they were studying a natural virus. The Wet Markets were getting out of hand with infection problems. The Chinese scientists were looking at viral strains coming from bats which had already caused the SARs epidemic. They couldn’t figure out why the new bat viruses were not directly infecting people and suspected it used intermediatoraries like SARS They knew something was happening in the market but what? It was a lot of genetic detective work. I know they were concerned because the wild animal markets were a problem. How to make the Wet Markets safer must have been their goal. It is unfortunate they let it get out of hand.