Report: US Department of Energy says Covid-19 may have come from Chinese lab

By Tom Gantert (The Center Square)

The US Department of Energy said the spread of COVID-19 was likely due to an accident at a Chinese laboratory, according to a Wall Street Journal report, which said it got its information from a classified intelligence report given to the White House and members of Congress.

The Wall Street Journal noted that the Energy Department had previously said it was unsure how the virus emerged. The change was cited in a 2021 document update published by the office of Director of National Intelligence Avril Hines.

NBC News followed up with its own report that the Energy Department had concluded with “low confidence” that the outbreak was caused by a laboratory leak in Wuhan, China. NBC News cited two sources with “direct knowledge” of the situation.

Since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic in 2020, many media outlets have labeled claims that COVID-19 originated from a lab in Wuhan, China as misinformation.

The Washington Post reported on May 25, 2021, “Scientists were quick to dismiss the possibility that the coronavirus emerged from a lab in early 2020.”

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USA Today reported on March 21, 2020, “Suggestions that the coronavirus was man-made or designed for use in Chinese biological weapons are false.” In February 2021, USA Today updated the story to reflect “current information” calling its verdict “partially false”.

The classified report, NBC reported, said there was consensus that COVID-19 was not the result of a bioweapon but that the leak was an “accident,” citing an anonymous source.

“I am 100% convinced that the virus was made in a Wuhan lab,” said Texas physician and US Congressman Ronny Jackson. Post on Twitter. “We are going to expose the cover-up. We’re going to find out how Fauci was involved in funding this. We are going to find out everything about the origin of covid!!”

Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases until his retirement in late 2022, told NBC’s “Meet the Press” in November 2022 that he had an “absolutely open mind” about the origin of COVID-19.

According to Politico, Fauci said respected virologists have strong evidence that the virus jumped from animals to humans.

However, Fauci told National Geographic in May 2020 that it “shows that the virus behind the pandemic was not made in a Chinese lab.”

National Geographic reports, “Based on scientific evidence, they [Fauci] An alternative theory is also not entertained – that someone discovered the coronavirus in the wild, brought it to a lab, and then it accidentally escaped.

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Nate Silver, founder of FiveThirtyEight, a polling analytics firm, criticized the suppression of debate over whether COVID originated in a lab.

“I will never forget the attitude of some scientists who used every trick in the book to stifle discussion of this issue,” Silver said He tweeted. “A great disservice to science and public health. They should be deeply embarrassed.”

Syndicated with permission from The Center Square.