[yorwba]

Well, in this case professional scientists actually made claims about the classification of the virus as soon as they had evidence, and before the government had put out an official statement. But then they got prosecuted for "spreading rumors" and people stopped talking publicly about the progress of their research.

Now the government is getting criticized for this by e.g. Hu Fanzhu of East China Normal University's National Discourse Environment Research Center, whose open letter you might want to read if you think stopping people from "spreading false information" is what's important here.

https://mp.weixin.qq.com/s/toFmfLsLn_x6PhGFliictg