Exclusive: China gene firm providing worldwide COVID tests worked with Chinese military

SYDNEY - BGI Group, the world’s largest genomics company, has worked with China’s military on research that ranges from mass testing for respiratory pathogens to brain science, a Reuters review of research, patent filings and other documents has found.

The review, of more than 40 publicly available documents and research papers in Chinese and English, shows BGI’s links to the People’s Liberation Army (PLA) include research with China’s top military supercomputing experts. The extent of those links has not previously been reported.

BGI has sold millions of COVID-19 test kits outside China since the outbreak of the new coronavirus pandemic, including to Europe, Australia and the United States. Shares of BGI Genomics Co, the company’s subsidiary listed on the Shenzhen stock exchange, have doubled in price over the past 12 months, giving it a market value of about $9 billion.

But top U.S. security officials have warned American labs against using Chinese tests because of concern China was seeking to gather foreign genetic data for its own research. BGI has denied that.

The documents reviewed by Reuters neither contradict nor support that U.S. suspicion. Still, the material shows that the links between the Chinese military and BGI run deeper than previously understood, illustrating how China has moved to integrate private technology companies into military-related research under President Xi Jinping.

The U.S. government has recently been warned by an expert panel that adversary countries and non-state actors might find and target genetic weaknesses in the U.S. population and a competitor such as China could use genetics to augment the strength of its own military personnel.

clever.

they collect us dna, isolated what they need
for the next designed, weaponized, $$$$making,
coronavirus-novel#25 to make SPECIFIC for US DNA.

clever.

fauXi will get right on it for them, with their CDC.

14 May: Reuters: China’s BGI gets Australian foothold through mass coronavirus test delivery
By Kirsty Needham
Australia says its purchase of 10 million coronavirus test kits from Chinese genomics company BGI will not risk patient privacy, as researchers hope for greater price competition in a biotech market dominated by a U.S rival.
The deal was struck even as relations between Australia and China have been strained by Australia’s call for a global enquiry into the coronavirus outbreak, which China has framed as a U.S.-led attempt to blame it for the pandemic.

BGI – Beijing Genomics Institute - has grown into one of the world’s largest genomics companies in the two decades since it worked on the Human Genome Project. It has one lab in Australia and had been seeking to expand its genome sequencing services.

BGI, whose BGI Genomics Co is listed on the Shenzhen stock exchange, was named as having “evident links” to the Chinese government in a U.S. Trade Office report into Chinese technology transfer practices that was used to justify the U.S. imposition of tariffs on Chinese exports.
There are also concerns about its work in China, including providing gene technology used for surveillance of the Uighur ethnic minority in China’s western Xinjiang region...

BGI is also defending multiple patent lawsuits from U.S. firm Illumina Inc, the dominant player in the Australian market...
https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-australia-china/chinas-bgi-gets-australian-foothold-through-mass-coronavirus-test-delivery-idINKBN22Q12P

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