Republicans on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee have been investigating the cause of the pandemic origin. Ahead of issuing the formal findings, Senator Richard Burr (NC) recently offered an interim report concluding that “the COVID-19 pandemic was, more likely than not, the result of a research-related incident.”
“While precedent of previous outbreaks of human infections from contact with animals favors the hypothesis that a natural zoonotic spillover is responsible for the origin of SARS-CoV-2, the emergence of SARS-CoV-2 that resulted in the COVID-19 pandemic was most likely the result of a research-related incident,” the report’s introduction reads. “This conclusion is not intended to be dispositive. The lack of transparency from government and public health officials in the PRC with respect to the origins of SARS-CoV-2 prevents reaching a more definitive conclusion.”In a release, the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee, of which Burr is ranking member, says there is “substantial evidence” suggesting that this was the cause of the pandemic, and that a research-related incident is consistent with early epidemiology showing the spread of the virus in the same district as the Wuhan Institute of Virology.The senators cited a pattern of “persistent biosafety problems” at the institute and said that there are evidentiary “gaps” in scientific research that point to a natural zoonotic spillover from animals sold at a market in Wuhan.
Legal Insurrection readers will hardly be surprised at the findings. We first reported the likely source of covid, a lab leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, in February of 2020.
In summary, somebody was entangled with the evolution of 2019-nCoV coronavirus. In addition to origins of natural recombination and intermediate host, the killer coronavirus probably originated from a laboratory in Wuhan. Safety level may need to be reinforced in high risk biohazardous laboratories. Regulations may be taken to relocate these laboratories far away from city center and other densely populated places.
However, reports like this were suppressed in early 2020 as “conspiracy theories” and “misinformation.” It appears that yesterday’s conspiracy theories are today’s breaking news.
Lest I leave the impression that it is only Republicans who now support the lab leak theory, ProPublica/Vanity Fair released a report making similar assertions.
The ProPublica/Vanity Fair investigative piece also shared shocking new details behind the suspicious Wuhan, China lab believed to be ground zero for the deadly virus — including inhumane and unsafe working conditions and rushed deadlines shortly before the first case of COVID-19 was confirmed in the country.The Wuhan Institute of Virology [WIV], a state-run and funded research facility home to China’s riskiest coronavirus research, had been under immense pressure by the ruling Chinese Communist Party [CCP] to produce scientific breakthroughs to raise China’s global status despite lacking resources, the ProPublica/Vanity Fair report said….Toy Reid, a career specialist for the RAND Corporation and former political officer in East Asia for the US State Department, was a member of the nine-person investigative team tasked with finding the cause of the virus, commissioned by Sen. Richard Burr (R-N.C.), according to the ProPublica/Vanity Fair report.For 15 months, Reid used his skill translating CCP “party speak,” — a veiled language used by party officials when talking about something potentially embarrassing — while reviewing troves of archives on the WIV’s website, according to the report.CCP dispatches reviewed by Reid reportedly signaled that the institute faced a serious safety emergency in November 2019 — weeks before China officially confirmed that people had been infected by the virus.
The piece is detailed, and it appears authors Katherine Eban (Vanity Fair) and Jeff Kao (ProPublica) did a deep dive into the available material.
Vanity Fair and ProPublica downloaded more than 500 documents from the WIV website, including party branch dispatches from 2017 to the present. To assess Reid’s interpretation, we sent key documents to experts on CCP communications. They told us that the WIV dispatches did indeed signal that the institute faced an acute safety emergency in November 2019; that officials at the highest levels of the Chinese government weighed in; and that urgent action was taken in an effort to address ongoing safety issues. The documents do not make clear who was responsible for the crisis, which laboratory it affected specifically or what the exact nature of the biosafety emergency was.The interim report also raises questions about how quickly vaccines were developed in China by some teams, including one led by a military virologist named Zhou Yusen. The report called it “unusual” that two military COVID-19 vaccine development teams were able to reach early milestones even faster than the major drug companies who were part of the U.S. government’s Operation Warp Speed program.
Neither outlet is exactly known for being right-wing organizations. Yet their assessment also corresponds to an earlier timeline developed by the Republican members of the House Foreign Affairs Committee about the origins of the SARS-Cov-2 pathogen and the point source of the pandemic. It was pretty damning for the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV).
Laughably, the New York Times completely dismissed that Senate Committee’s report as “a new wave of political wrangling” over Covid’s origins if Republicans gain control of the House or Senate.
Scientists are bracing for a new wave of political wrangling over the origins of the virus in the coming year, especially if Republican backers of the lab leak theory take control of committees in the House or Senate.Several researchers who have studied the beginnings of the pandemic, though, described the Burr report as a step backward in the effort to understand that period.
Does that mean Republicans will pounce or seize on this matter after the results of the upcoming wave election results are tallied?
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