Coronavirus lab leak theory finds growing support

While some scientists are open to the theory of a lab leak, others still believe the virus originated in animals, mutated and made its way into humans.

WASHINGTON. Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, governments and health authorities around the world have been overlooking an important question: Did the virus originate in animals or was it leaked from a Chinese lab?

Now the US Department of Energy has rated it with “low confidence” that it started with a lab leak, according to a person familiar with the report, who was not authorized to discuss it. The report has not been made public.

But others in the US intelligence community disagree.

“Right now, there is no consensus within the US government on exactly how COVID started,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said on Monday. “There is simply no consensus in the intelligence community.”

The Department of Energy’s opinion was first published over the weekend in the Wall Street Journal, saying the secret report is based on new data and noted in a 2021 document update. The Department of Energy oversees the national network of laboratories.

White House officials on Monday declined to confirm press reports of the assessment.

In 2021, officials released an intelligence summary stating that four members of the U.S. intelligence community believed with low confidence that the virus was first transmitted from an animal to humans, and a fifth believed with moderate confidence that the first human infection was due to laboratory.

While some scientists are open to the theory of a lab leak, others continue to believe that the virus originated from animals, mutated and made its way into humans — as viruses have done in the past. Experts say the true origin of the pandemic may be unknown for years – if ever.

CALLS FOR ADDITIONAL INVESTIGATION

The Office of the US Director of National Intelligence declined to comment on the report. All 18 US intelligence community offices had access to the information that the Department of Energy used for its assessment.

Alina Chan, a molecular biologist at MIT and Harvard, said she was not sure what new intelligence the agencies had, but it was “reasonable to infer” that it was related to the activities of the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China. . She said the 2018 research proposal, co-authored by local scientists and their US counterparts, “essentially outlines the blueprint for viruses like COVID.”

“In less than two years, such a virus caused an outbreak in the city,” she said.

The Wuhan Institute has been studying coronaviruses for years, in part because of widespread fears dating back to SARS that coronaviruses could be the source of the next pandemic.

No intelligence agency has said it believes the coronavirus that caused COVID-19 was deliberately released. The unclassified 2021 report is clear: “We believe the virus was not developed as a bioweapon.”

“Accidents in the laboratory happen with surprising frequency. A lot of people don’t really hear about lab accidents because they’re not talked about publicly,” said Chan, co-author of a book about finding the origins of COVID-19. Such accidents “highlight the need to make the work with high-risk pathogens more transparent and accountable.”

Last year, the World Health Organization recommended a deeper investigation into a possible accident at the lab. Chan said she hopes the latest report will spark new investigations in the United States.

China called “unfounded” the assumption that COVID-19 originated in a Chinese laboratory.

SUPPORT FOR ANIMAL THEORY

Many scientists believe that the animal-to-human transmission theory remains far more plausible. They suggest that it appeared in the wild and passed from bats to humans, either directly or through another animal.

In a 2021 research paper in the journal Cell, scientists said the COVID-19 virus is the ninth documented coronavirus to infect humans, with all previous ones originating in animals.

Two studies published last year in the journal Science supported the animal origin theory. This study found that the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan was likely an early epicenter. Scientists concluded that the virus probably passed from animals to humans twice.

“The scientific literature contains little more than original research papers supporting the natural origin of this viral pandemic,” said Michael Sparrow, an evolutionary biologist at the University of Arizona who has extensively studied the origins of COVID-19.

He said the fact that others in the intelligence community were looking at the same information as the Department of Energy, and “obviously it didn’t move the needle, says a lot.” He said he takes such intelligence assessments with a pinch of salt because he doesn’t think the people doing them “have the scientific background … to really understand the most important evidence they need to understand.”

The US needs to be more transparent and release new intelligence that appears to have affected the Department of Energy, Sparrow said.

RESPONSE TO THE REPORT

The Department of Energy’s conclusion is becoming clear as Republicans in the House of Representatives used their new majority to investigate every aspect of the pandemic, including the origin, as well as what they believe was an attempt by officials to cover up the fact that it leaked from a lab in Wuhan. . Earlier this month, Republicans sent letters to Dr. Anthony Fauci, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haynes, Health Secretary Xavier Bexer and others as part of their investigative efforts.

The retired Fauci, who was the nation’s top infectious disease expert under both Republican and Democratic presidents, called the GOP criticism bullshit.

Rep. Mike McCall, D-Tex., chairman of the House Foreign Relations Committee, asked the Biden administration to provide Congress with a “full and thorough” briefing on the report and the evidence behind it.

Kirby, a spokesman for the National Security Council, stressed that President Joe Biden thinks it’s important to know what happened “so we can better prevent future pandemics,” but that such research “should be done in a safe and secure manner and as transparently as possible to the rest of the world.” “

AP reporters Farnoush Amiri, Nomaan Merchant and Seung Min Kim contributed. Ungar reported from Louisville, Kentucky.

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