The world is currently is currently in near-panic mode as the deadly coronavirus continues to spread and cross borders. And according to one Israeli expert, it might be part of China’s biological weapons program.

In an interview with The Washington Times, Dany Shoham noted that the outbreak began and remains worst in the city of Wuhan, which is home to the only declared facility capable of working with such deadly viruses, the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

Despite Chinese instance that it has no biological weapons program, the institute is believed to serve the dual purpose of civilian and military research.

And Shoham thinks coronavirus might have accidentally leaked from there.

“Coronaviruses [particularly SARS] have been studied in the institute and are probably held therein,” said Shoham. “In principle, outward virus infiltration might take place either as leakage or as an indoor unnoticed infection of a person that normally went out of the concerned facility. This could have been the case with the Wuhan Institute of Virology, but so far there isn’t evidence or indication for such incident.”

Lt.-Col. (Ret.) Dany Shoham holds a doctorate in medical microbiology. For over 20 years (from 1970-1991) he was a senior analyst with IDF intelligence for biological and chemical warfare in the Middle East.

More recently, Shoham has been working at the Begin-Sadat Center for Strategic Studies at Bar Ilan University, where he has studied China’s clandestine biological weapons program.

In other words, the man knows of what he speaks.