[LI] The likelihood of the virus remaining hard to transmit to humans might remain low unless the scientists at the Wuhan Institute of Virology decided to add a few "gain of function" enhancements to H7N9.
Which, it appears, they have. The team there has just published a paper (hat-tip National Pulse): Combined insertion of basic and non-basic amino acids at the hemagglutinin cleavage site of highly pathogenic H7N9 virus promotes replication and pathogenicity in chickens and mice.
The paper was published in Virologica Sinica, the journal put out by the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Its editor-in-chief is Zheng-Li Shi. That name should be familiar to those of you who have been following the covid story, as she is the infamous "Bat Lady" of Wuhan.