  Tyshkovskiy and Panchin have recently published a commentary on our paper in
which they outline several "points of disagreement with the Segreto/Deigin
hypothesis". As our paper is titled "The genetic structure of SARS-CoV-2 does
not rule out a laboratory origin", points of disagreement should provide
evidence that rules out a laboratory origin. However, Tyshkovskiy and Panchin
provide no such evidence and instead attempt to criticize our arguments that
highlight aspects of SARS-CoV-2 that could be consistent with the lab leak
hypothesis. Strikingly, Tyshkovskiy and Panchin's main point of criticism is
based on a false premise that we have claimed RaTG13 to be a direct progenitor
of SARS-CoV-2, and their other points of criticism are either incorrect or
irrelevant to our hypotheses. Thus, the genetic structure of SARS-CoV-2 remains
consistent with both natural or laboratory origin, which means that both the
zoonotic and the lab leak hypothesis need to be investigated equally
thoroughly.

Genomics;Populations and Evolution