TWiV rebuts a recent opinion piece which falsely claims that the COVID-19 pandemic began in a lab (it began in Nature), followed by a discussion of Paride bacteriophage, which has the unsual property of being able to kill dormant, antibiotic-tolerant cells by direct lytic replication.

From ASM Microbe in Houston, Texas, Vincent speaks with Eddie Holmes about the evidence that SARS-CoV-2 spilled over into humans in the Huanan Market in Wuhan, absence of evidence for other origins, and his work on the virosphere.

Vincent travels to the University of Pennsylvania to meet up with Susan, Rick, Gigi and David to discuss the origin of SARS-CoV-2, how the FBI might have reached its conclusion on the matter, and public and political perception of scientific risk.

Vincent travels to Montreux, Switzerland and the 16th International Nidovirus Symposium, where he speaks with Maria von Kerkhove, the face of COVID-19 for the World Health Organization, and Kanta Subbarao, Director of the WHO Collaborating Centre on Influenza in Melbourne.

TWiV discusses genetic evidence of susceptible wildlife in SARS-CoV-2 positive samples at the Huanan Wholesale Seafood Market, polio cases in African linked to a new polio vaccine that was designed to not cause the disease, and structural conservation of hepatitis B virus capsid proteins over millions of years despite a shift from a naked to an enveloped capsid.