Meet the scientists investigating the origins of the COVID pandemic: Christian Drosten, a virologist at the Charité hospital in Berlin, notes that invitations to apply for the team were only sent to members of the WHO’s Global Outbreak Alert and Response Network (GOARN), a closed group with experience in outbreak response. Many researchers with relevant expertise were not given the opportunity to apply, says Drosten, who received the e-mail, but missed the invitation while on holiday. “They could and should have issued this as a more open call.”
Although the team members are highly qualified, eight out of ten are men and investigators from Europe dominate the group
