(NYT) – All of this was done outside high containment, two rungs short of the sort of precautions reserved for the deadliest pathogens. Leading virologists rang the alarm, saying that the level of safety was inadequate for a new virus potentially capable of infecting people through the air.

When Cell drew criticism for publishing the study, a spokesperson for the journal said that biosafety decisions like these rest with a study’s lead scientist and its institution and that the researchers “did not break any rules or policies of the journal.” Cell was right. In China and in the United States there are surprisingly few constraints on this type of research. Scientists can still gather novel coronaviruses, enhance them in the lab under relatively low biosafety conditions and even accidentally cause an outbreak — without breaking any rules. (Read More)