S8 Ep765: The construction of the Wuhan BSL4 lab proceeded despite French intelligence warnings that the facility would be used for military bioweapon production. Weichert notes the lab suffered from poor security protocols known to US intelligence and Xi Jinpin
The John Batchelor Show
John Batchelor
4.5 • 2.8K Ratings
🗓️ 19 April 2026
⏱️ 13 minutes
🧾️ Download transcript
Summary
The construction of the Wuhan BSL4 lab proceeded despite French intelligence warnings that the facility would be used for military bioweapon production. Weichert notes the lab suffered from poor security protocols known to USintelligence and Xi Jinping prior to the pandemic, links Chinese researchers in Canada to Major General Chen Wei — the "Goddess of War" who oversaw the Wuhan lab's COVID-19 response — and describes how the EcoHealth Alliance facilitated gain-of-function research in Wuhan while political polarization suppressed early discourse on the lab leak theory. (4)
1965 SHANGHAI
Transcript
Click on a timestamp to play from that location
| 0:00.0 | This is CBSI on the world. |
| 0:06.9 | I'm John Batchel, visiting with Brandon Weikert. |
| 0:09.6 | His new book is Biohacked. |
| 0:11.5 | China's race to control life. |
| 0:13.6 | This is biotechnology theft. |
| 0:17.0 | This is biotechnology bribery. |
| 0:19.2 | This is biotechnology accidental discoveries, question mark, in China. |
| 0:25.1 | We go to Wuhan, COVID-19. |
| 0:28.3 | The revelations here begin with the construction of the Wuhan laboratory. |
| 0:35.0 | There's something called a BSL-4. The original concept was from early parts of this |
| 0:42.3 | century, I believe 2003. The Chinese had a contract with a French firm, and it took many years |
| 0:49.3 | to build the Wuhan lab that is now at the center of the investigation long term of the origins of COVID-19. |
| 0:57.0 | Brendan, why did it take so long to build that lab? What do we know about the security of that lab? |
| 1:04.2 | Well, thank you for that. Yes, basically, a French company decided to build a biosafety level four lab, but BSL4 is a designation. |
| 1:14.5 | That means it's a lab that has the highest security clearance that can basically manipulate and play with the world's worst pathogens. |
| 1:21.6 | This is the most dangerous kind of lab. |
| 1:25.0 | And it's something that is highly regulated by the international community because |
| 1:29.4 | of the dangers of spillouts or lab leaks and whatnot and the unintended consequences of that. |
| 1:35.4 | The French gave this capability to China. And French intelligence, the reason it took so long to build this lab in Wuhan was because |
| 1:47.3 | French intelligence was warning the French firm. It's a Leon-based firm. I was warning the French |
| 1:53.7 | firm if you complete this lab, it's going to be used not just for creating world-renowned vaccines |
| 2:00.1 | for some of the worst diseases, |
... |
Please login to see the full transcript.
Disclaimer: The podcast and artwork embedded on this page are from John Batchelor, and are the property of its owner and not affiliated with or endorsed by Tapesearch.
Generated transcripts are the property of John Batchelor and are distributed freely under the Fair Use doctrine. Transcripts generated by Tapesearch are not guaranteed to be accurate.
Copyright © Tapesearch 2026.