UK Lab Engineers Chimeric H7N7 Bird Flu Hybrids Allowing Asymptomatic Spread of Lethal Virus
Two synthetic H7N7 hybrids demonstrated silent, high-risk shedding behavior in experimental chickens.
JON FLEETWOOD
The United Kingdom’s top government virology lab engineered new avian influenza viruses using reverse genetics, according to an October paper in Virology documenting the deliberate construction and experimental infection of chickens with synthetic H7N7 avian influenza variants.
The study findings are revealed as the WHO builds a permanent international system for collecting, storing, and redistributing pathogens under its new Pandemic Agreement.
The work, performed at the Animal and Plant Health Agency (APHA-Weybridge), reconstructed the mutation pathway by which low-pathogenic bird flu transitions into a lethal high-path strain.
The study confirms that government researchers created two genetically engineered influenza viruses, altered at the exact molecular switch responsible for converting mild bird flu into its highly pathogenic form.
The paper—“Infection of point-of-lay hens to assess the sequential events during H7N7 high-pathogenicity avian influenza emergence at a layer premises”—states that APHA scientists generated two recombinant H7N7 viruses through reverse genetics (“RG”):
“Two viable RG rescued recombinant LPAIVs were genetically identical to the isolated H7N7-HPAIV except for the CS, with one containing a DBCS (H7N7-DBCS) and the other a SBCS (H7N7-SBCS).”
These engineered viruses were then used to infect groups of live hens under SAPO Level 4/ACDP Level 3 biocontainment—the UK’s highest animal-pathogen security facilities.
The bird flu experiment raises national security concerns, given that Congress, the White House, the Department of Energy, the FBI, the CIA, and Germany’s Federal Intelligence Service (BND) have confirmed that the COVID-19 pandemic was likely the result of lab-engineered pathogen manipulation.
Governments all over the world are performing the same experiments on bird flu pathogens.
Creating New Bird Flu Viruses With Engineered Cleavage Sites
The engineered viruses differed only at the hemagglutinin (HA) cleavage site, the key molecular feature that determines whether an avian influenza virus remains low-pathogenic or becomes systemically lethal.
- H7N7-SBCS: a synthetic virus with a single-basic cleavage site
- H7N7-DBCS: a synthetic virus with a di-basic cleavage site
Both constructs kept all internal genes identical to a known high-path H7N7 outbreak strain, meaning APHA researchers produced low-path versions of a high-path virus with engineered cleavage-site mutations.
The paper states:
“The SBCS, DBCS and MBCS (HPAIV) viruses were otherwise genetically identical (including the internal genes).”
In plain terms, they took the genome of a highly pathogenic bird flu virus, edited the cleavage site to make it “low-path,” and then infected chickens to observe how the high-path virus might emerge again.
This is the same cleavage-site mutation that historically turns H5 and H7 viruses into lethal strains.
The Engineered Viruses Showed New Functional Behavior
Although created as “low-path” models, the engineered viruses demonstrated new and concerning biological behavior:
- Infection rates differed sharply between the constructs.
- The DBCS-engineered virus behaved more like a high-path precursor.
- Birds exposed to engineered strains survived later high-path challenge—but 95% still shed high-path virus, creating silent spreaders.
The study reports:
“Prior H7N7-LPAIV exposure did not prevent H7N7-HPAIV replication… 20/21 (95%) shed H7N7-HP.”
That means infected birds carried and expelled high-path virus without dying, a dangerous epidemiological function not typical of standard high-path bird flu outbreaks.
This creates a superspreading scenario in which visibly healthy birds shed lethal virus into water, bedding, and surrounding environments.
The environmental sampling confirmed this:
“H7N7-HPAIV environmental contamination occurred… in drinking water and mixed straw/faeces.”
A Step-by-Step Reconstruction of How High-Path Bird Flu Emerges
The study explicitly aimed to recreate the sequential mutation steps under which a low-path strain turns into a high-path one.
The authors describe the goal:
“Our current study aimed to model the sequential events… beginning with H7N7-LPAIV incursion, followed 2 weeks later by H7N7-HPAIV challenge.”
This experiment reproduces, in controlled conditions:
- Introduction of engineered low-path virus
- Mild, low-level infection
- A second exposure to a high-path strain
- Silent onward shedding of the high-path virus
- Environmental contamination
- Survival of spreading hosts
This combination of enhanced survival + sustained shedding is precisely the kind of phenotype that raises dual-use questions in influenza engineering.
Conducted in Government BSL-3/4 Facilities
All work occurred at APHA-Weybridge under strict containment:
“Experiments were carried out in UK approved SAPO level 4, ACDP level 3 biocontainment laboratories.”
SAPO Level 4 is one of the highest pathogen-containment designations in the UK, typically associated with agents capable of major agricultural or economic harm.
Bottom Line
A UK government virology lab:
- engineered two new influenza viruses,
- from a known high-pathogenic backbone,
- altered the cleavage site, the genetic switch controlling lethality,
- infected live hens with the engineered constructs,
- and documented how these modifications enabled silent high-path virus replication and shedding.
This work confirms the intentional creation of new influenza viruses and demonstrates functional behaviors—particularly prolonged shedding without mortality—that raise significant dual-use and biosecurity concerns.
The world may be one step closer to another lab-made pandemic.
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