Fever: The Hunt for Covid's Origin - Episode 1

Seriously...

BBC

Society & Culture, Documentary

4.1 • 885 Ratings

🗓️ 18 July 2023

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

As a deadly new virus starts spreading in Wuhan, China, so do rumours about a lab there.

In the remote, jungle-covered hills of China’s far-southwestern Yunnan Province, teams of scientists have spent years intensively researching one animal: bats. The scientists are virus hunters, trying to better understand and mitigate the threat of new viruses jumping from bats to other animals and humans, potentially setting off a pandemic.

Their samples of bat droppings are brought back to labs, including the Wuhan Institute of Virology. So when a new coronavirus begins killing people in that same city, questions are raised about whether the people trying to stop a pandemic could’ve accidentally triggered one.

Archive: CBS; The White House; NPR; CGTN; NBC.

Presenter: John Sudworth Series producer: Simon Maybin Editor: Richard Vadon Sound design and mix: James Beard Commissioning editor: Dan Clarke Science advice: Julian Siddle and Victoria Gill Extra production: Eva Artesona and Kathy Long Research support: Zisheng Xu and BBC Monitoring Production coordinators: Siobhan Reed, Helena Warwick-Cross, Sophie Hill, and Debbie Richford Theme and original music: Pete Cunningham, with trumpet by Joss Murray Radio 4 Editor of Editorial Standards: Roger Mahony Head of BBC News - Long Form Audio: Emma Rippon

Transcript

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0:00.0	This was an impregnable fortress. The only way you get out was in a wooden box.
0:05.0	The controversial maximum security prison impossible to escape from.
0:09.0	And one of the duties of a political prisoner is the escape.
0:12.0	The IRA inmates who found a way. of a political prisoner is the escape.
0:12.5	The IRA inmates who found a way.
0:14.5	I'm Carlo Gableer and I'll be navigating a path
0:19.5	through the disturbing inside story of the biggest jailbreak in British and Irish history.
0:25.0	The narrative that they want is that this is a big achievement by them.
0:28.5	Escape from the maze, listen first on BBC Sounds.
0:36.0	BBC Sounds. BBC Sounds, music radio podcasts.
0:40.0	Hello, you're listening to Seriously, from BBC Radio 4. I'm John Sudworth, and I was the BBC's China correspondent
0:48.5	for almost a decade. In my new podcast series, Fever, the Hunt for COVID's origin, I investigate a question that's been caught up in the polarised and toxic politics of our time, but it's an important one. Where did COVID come from? Keep listening
1:07.6	for episode one and to hear the rest of the series just search for fever on BBC sounds. Very close to that. She should be a right-hand turn in a second.
1:31.0	We're deep in the remote jungle-covered hills of China's far southwestern Yunnan province.
1:37.0	Keck on the edge here, it's a long way down there.
1:40.0	We're a little apprehensive.
1:42.0	Night has fallen fast and we're being watched.
1:45.0	He just said, no outside there is a house.
1:50.0	They just ask you to go back, back and enter their village.
1:54.0	Foreign journalists are routinely followed and obstructed in China,
1:58.0	and I've had my fair share.
2:00.0	But this is something else.
	...

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