Re-examines Jesse Bloom’s 2021 recovered-deep-sequencing analysis (S-4) using metadata and additional genomes published since 2021. Finds the recovered sequences’ collection date (30 Jan 2020) was later than, not earlier than, hundreds of other already-public early sequences, undercutting Bloom’s framing of them as an undersampled early/progenitor-like genotype; shows the mutational diversity in the recovered sequences is consistent with contemporaneous late-January Wuhan sampling rather than with an earlier, more-bat-like progenitor; and argues a Wuhan-exposure history was already common across many early deposited sequences, so Bloom’s inference of a specific under-sampled Wuhan sub-lineage is not supported by the annotation record. Concludes the 2021 “deleted data” findings do not, on reexamination, strengthen the progenitor argument (S-3) as claimed.
relevance_note: the current state of the direct rebuttal to the “recovered/deleted sequences support an earlier, hidden progenitor” argument that anchors much of the “the record was curated” reasoning.