iiYears after the COVID-19 pandemic caused devastation across the globe, a US investigation has found that the coronavirus likely leaked from a laboratory in China. The conclusion, by the Republican-led House Select Subcommittee on the Pandemic after an inquiry into the outbreak which claimed over 1.1 million American lives, is not the first of its kind.
On December 2, the subcommittee issued a sweeping 520-page report on the virus’s origins, federal and state responses, and vaccination efforts. The findings support the lab leak theory, pointing to SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, as likely having escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where the outbreak first emerged.
In a letter to Congress, panel chair Brad Wenstrup underscored the importance of the investigation: “This work will help the United States, and the world, predict the next pandemic, prepare for the next pandemic, protect ourselves from the next pandemic, and hopefully prevent the next pandemic.”
The investigation included voluminous research, comprising 25 meetings, over 30 interviews, and a review of more than one million documents. Notably, the investigation included testimony from Dr. Anthony Fauci, the former Chief Medical Advisor to the President. Though some Republicans have criticized Fauci for allegedly funding Chinese scientists linked to the virus, he has denied any cover-up and contended that it was “molecularly impossible” for the bat viruses studied in Wuhan to have been engineered into SARS-CoV-2.
Contrary to the claims made by Fauci, it says SARS-CoV-2 “likely emerged due to a laboratory or research-related incident.” It even accused NIH of funding “gain-of-function” studies at Wuhan lab–an approach meant to reinforce viruses with the aim of better understanding such threats.
Besides its conclusions about the virus’s origins, the subcommittee also criticized public health measures during the pandemic. It said that lockdowns caused “more harm than good,” and mask mandates were “ineffective at controlling” COVID-19. The report also attacked social distancing guidelines, which runs counter to other studies indicating such measures did help reduce virus transmission.
In contrast, the Republican report hailed Operation Warp Speed, which the Trump administration created to speed up vaccine development, as a “tremendous success.”
