The evidence of a possible laboratory creation revolves around a
multi-year US-led research program that involved US and Chinese
scientists. The research was designed by US scientists, funded mainly by
the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Department
of Defense, and administered by a US organization, the EcoHealth
Alliance (EHA), with much of the work taking place at the Wuhan
Institute of Virology (WIV).
Here are facts that we know as of today.
First, the NIH became the home for biodefense
research starting in 2001. In other words, the NIH
became a research arm of the military and intelligence communities.
Biodefense funding from the Defense Department budget went to Dr.
Anthony Fauci’s division, the
National
Institute for Allergies and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).
Second, NIAID and DARPA (in the Defense Department) supported extensive
research on potential pathogens for biowarfare and biodefense, and for
the design of vaccines to protect against biowarfare or accidental
laboratory releases of natural or manipulated pathogens.
Some of the work was carried out at the Rocky
Mountain Laboratories of the NIH, which manipulated and tested viruses using its in-house bat colony.
Third, NIAID became a large-scale financial supporter of Gain of
Function (GoF) research, meaning laboratory experiments designed to
genetically alter pathogens to make them even more pathogenic, such as
viruses that are easier to transmit and/or more likely
to kill infected individuals. This kind of research is inherently
dangerous, both because it aims to create more dangerous pathogens and
because those new pathogens can escape from the laboratory, either
accidentally or deliberately (e.g., as an act of biowarfare
or terrorism).
Fourth, many leading US scientists opposed GoF research. One of the
leading opponents inside the government was Dr. Robert Redfield, an Army
virologist who would later be the Director of the Centers for Disease
Control (CDC) at the start of the pandemic. Redfield
suspected from the start that the pandemic resulted from NIH-supported
research,
but
says that he was sidelined by Fauci.
Fifth, because of the very high risks associated with GoF research, the
US Government added additional biosafety regulations in 2017. GoF
research would have to be carried out in highly secure laboratories,
meaning at Biosafety Level 3 (BSL-3) or Biosafety
Level 4 (BSL-4). Work in a BSL-3 or 4 facility is more expensive and
time-consuming than work in a BSL-2 facility because of the added
controls against an escape of the pathogen from the facility.
Sixth, one NIH-backed research group, EcoHealth Alliance (EHA), proposed
to move some of its GoF research to the Wuhan Institute of Virology
(WIV). In 2017, EHA submitted a proposal to the US Government’s Defense
Advanced Research Projects (DARPA) for GoF work
at WIV. The proposal, named DEFUSE, was a veritable “cookbook” for
making viruses
like
SARS-CoV-2 in the laboratory. The DEFUSE plan was to
investigate more than 180 previously unreported strains of
Betacoronavirus that had been collected by WIV, and to use GoF
techniques to make these viruses more dangerous. Specifically, the
project proposed to add protease sites like the furin cleavage site
(FCS) to natural viruses in order to enhance the infectivity and
transmissibility of the virus.
Seventh, in the draft proposal, the EHA director
boasted that
“the BSL2 nature of work on SARSr-CoVs makes our system highly cost
effective relative to other bat-virus systems,” prompting the lead
scientist on the EHA proposal to comment that US scientists would “freak
out” if they learned of US government support for GoF research at WIV in a BSL2 facility.
Eighth, the Defense Department rejected the DEFUSE proposal in 2018, yet
NIAID funding for EHA covered the key scientists of the DEFUSE project.
EHA therefore had ongoing NIH funding to carry out the DEFUSE research
program.
Ninth, when the outbreak was first noted in Wuhan in late 2019 and
January 2020, key US virologists associated with NIH believed that the
SARS-CoV-2 had most likely emerged from GoF research, and said so on a
phone
call with Fauci on February 1, 2020. The most striking
clue for these scientists was the presence of the FCS in SARS-CoV-2,
with the FCS appearing at exactly the location in the virus (the S1/S2
junction) that had been proposed in the DEFUSE
program.
Tenth, the top NIH officials, including Director Francis Collins and
NIAID Director Fauci, tried to hide the NIH-supported GoF research, and
promoted
the publication of a scientific paper (“The
Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2”) in March 2020 declaring a natural origin of the virus. The paper completely ignored the DEFUSE proposal.
Eleventh, some US officials began to point their fingers at WIV as the
source of the laboratory leak while hiding the NIH-funding and EHA-led
research program that may have led to the virus.
Twelfth, the above facts have come to light only as a result of intrepid
investigative reporting, whistleblowers, and leaks from inside the US
Government, including the leak of the DEFUSE proposal. The Inspector
General of the Department of Health and Human
Services determined in 2023 that NIH
did not adequately oversee the EHA grants.
Thirteenth, investigators have also realized in retrospect that
researchers at Rocky Mountain Labs, together with key scientists
associated with EHA, were
infecting
the RML Egyptian fruit bats with SARS-like viruses in experiments closely linked to those proposed in DEFUSE.
Fourteenth, the
FBI and Department
of Energy have reported their assessments that the laboratory escape of SARS-CoV-2 is the most likely explanation of the virus.
Fifteenth, a
whistleblower from inside the CIA has recently charged
that the CIA team investigating the outbreak concluded that SARS-CoV-2
most likely emerged from the laboratory, but that senior CIA officials
bribed the team to report a natural origin of
the virus.
The sum of the evidence – and the absence of reliable evidence pointing to a natural origin (see
here and
here)
– adds up to the possibility that the US funded and implemented a
dangerous GoF research program that led to the creation of SARS-CoV-2
and then to a worldwide pandemic. A
powerful
recent assessment by mathematical biologist Alex
Washburne reaches the conclusion “beyond reasonable doubt that
SARS-CoV-2 emerged from a lab…” He also notes that the collaborators
“proceeded to mount what can legitimately be called a disinformation
campaign” to hide the laboratory origin.
A US-funded laboratory origin of Covid-19 would certainly constitute the
most significant case of governmental gross negligence in world
history. Moreover, there is a high likelihood that the US Government
continues to this day to fund dangerous GoF work as
part of its biodefense program. The US owes the full truth, and perhaps
ample financial compensation, to the rest of the world, depending on
what the facts ultimately reveal.
We need three urgent actions. The first is an independent scientific
investigation in which all laboratories involved in the EHA research
program in the US and China fully open their books and records to the
independent investigators. The second is a worldwide
halt on GoF research until an independent global scientific body sets
grounds rules for biosafety. The third is for the UN General Assembly to
establish rigorous legal and financial accountability for governments
that violate international safety norms through
dangerous research activities that threaten the health and security of
the rest of the world.