National Microbiology Lab cuts ties with scientists amidst RCMP probe

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This article was published 07/02/2021 (1418 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

OTTAWA — The Winnipeg-based National Microbiology Lab has cut ties with two scientists who sent virus samples to China and were accused of unspecified policy breaches, though the RCMP are still investigating.

Dr. Xiangguo Qiu and her husband, Keding Cheng, were walked out of the Arlington Street building in July 2019, over what Ottawa has only described as an administrative matter.

“The two scientists are no longer employed by the Public Health Agency of Canada, as of Jan. 20, 2021,” Public Heath Agency of Canada spokesman Eric Morrissette wrote Monday.

“We cannot disclose additional information, nor comment further, for reasons of confidentiality.”

Employees of the special pathogens unit told the Free Press supervisors verbally communicated the two had been fired, and would not provide their colleagues with an explanation.

Qiu had previously received one of Canada’s top science awards, for her pivotal role in creating an Ebola vaccine at the Winnipeg lab, one of the few equipped to handle pathogens needing the highest level of containment.

In March 2019, Qiu sent samples of the Ebola and Henipah viruses to China. Internal emails suggest intellectual property protocols were not followed, though PHAC has denied this, without providing any further explanation.

The agency also claimed the shipment of samples were unrelated to agency’s investigation of the two scientists.

The University of Manitoba had severed links with both scientists shortly after the incident got media coverage in 2019, without providing a public explanation.

Scientists at the lab continue to be critical of PHAC for its secrecy around the case. Conspiracy websites have tried to fill the vacuum, honing in on PHAC authorizing Qiu to travel multiple times to a high-security lab in Wuhan, China, the city where the novel coronavirus emerged.

No officials have produced credible evidence to link the emergence of COVID-19 to Qiu or the Wuhan lab.

PHAC had no response Monday to criticism around its lack of transparency. The agency also would not say whether the two scientists had been on the payroll for 19 months — which is what employees at the lab say they’ve been told.

An ongoing Manitoba RCMP probe has still not led to any charges.

“The RCMP investigation is ongoing,” media relations officer Tara Seel wrote Monday.

dylan.robertson@freepress.mb.ca