
National security chair of the subcommittee Brad Wenstrup (Republican-Ohio), notes that the Wuhan Institute has a poor track record when it comes to biosafety and was conducting this research at only a level two lab (BSL2 lab) – “described as the ‘Wild West’ by Dr Jeremy Farrar, a virologist from the UK and now chief scientist for the World Health Organization.”
Records show the NIH allowed American entities to “conduct risky research on novel coronaviruses” at the Wuhan lab.
Metzl repeated Wenstrup’s statement that “there is no smoking gun” proving the lab leak theory, but added, “The growing body of circumstantial evidence suggests a gun that is, at the very least, warm to the touch.”
All four witnesses agreed the lab leak theory is not a conspiracy, with Auwaerter, the sole witness called in by the Democratic minority, adding that “It has been approached as such.” The witnesses also uniformly agreed there was insufficient evidence available in early 2020 to dismiss the theory outright.
Redfield noted that not only was this theory nevertheless dismissed by many scientists and the media early in the pandemic but its proponents were also attacked.
“The most upsetting thing to me was the Baltimore Sun calling me a racist because I said this came from a Wuhan lab,” Redfield said.
Addressing the document memo released on Sunday by the subcommittee, Wenstrup said it highlights “new evidence that suggests Fauci promoted the drafting of a publication that would disprove the lab leak theory,” and that evidence was “skewed” to achieve this goal.
The publication in question is a March 2020 article in Nature Medicine, “The proximal origin of SARS-CoV-2,” which assured the public that the virus’ genome demonstrated an origin in wildlife.
Hundreds of news organisations cited the article to assert that the lab leak theory was a “conspiracy theory.”
“Why did Dr Fauci work so hard for just one of those theories?” Representative Jim Jordan (Republican-Ohio) asked, referring to the natural origins theory.
Wade testified that “the campaign to discredit [the] lab leak began on the evening of January 31, 2020, when Fauci received an email from four virologists” who concluded that Covid-19 “could not have been made in nature.”
“Fauci was probably not too pleased to hear that the virus might have escaped from research that his agency funded,” said Wade.
“A strange thing happened to the virologists’ conclusion within four days,” he added, noting that they suddenly changed their minds – even though no new evidence materialised during this time.
According to Jordan, “There’s nine million reasons why they changed their mind,” pointing out that three months after their about-face, the four scientists received a $9 million grant from Fauci. Jordan said the subcommittee likely will call the authors of the paper to testify.
Redfield noted that while he had been in communication with Fauci in January 2020, he was then “excluded” from further calls discussing the origins of Covid-19, even though he was CDC director at the time.
“I was quite upset as the CDC director that I was excluded [from] those discussions,” Redfield said. He said he believed he was excluded because he had “a different point of view.”
“I was told they made a decision that they would keep this confidential until they came up with a single narrative, which I will argue is antithetical to science,” said Redfield. “Science never selects a single narrative.”
“When you have a group of people that decide there could only be one point of view, that’s problematic,” Redfield said. “They squashed any debate.”
Addressing the “Proximal Origins” paper, Redfield described it as “an inaccurate paper that basically was part of [the] narrative they were creating.”
Redfield also told the committee, “There’s no doubt that NIH was funding gain-of-function research,” and that the research also received funding from the US State Department, the US Department of Defence and the US Agency for International Development.
Wade testified that the media was then used “to establish the natural origin theory”: “If the evidence for lab leak is so strong, why do so many people still believe the virus came from nature? The reason is that the natural origin camp got its story out first – always a big help. It very successfully painted ‘lab leak’ as a conspiracy theory before anyone had publicly proposed it.
“The national media swallowed the natural origin story ubsceptically and once committed to it, failed to report important contrary evidence … Journalists in particular, it seems to me, failed on their job by failing to check out the virologists’ self-serving claims.”
These pressures extended to the academic and scientific community, according to Metzl. He testified that “All of the members of that community were aggressively trying to place scientific papers with journals and had zero success. So, there was a wall that was extremely difficult to get over.”
Metzl added: “When a small handful of us in the earliest days of the pandemic began raising the possibility of a possible lab origin, there [were] ferociously strong headwinds. There was this manufactured consensus.
“I’m a lifelong Democrat, I consider myself a progressive person, but I kept digging. I couldn’t find the justification for these strong arguments, calling people like me, investigating, looking into pandemic origins in good faith, conspiracy theorists.”
Auwaerter said, “There’s no consensus yet about the virus’ origins,” and that “many virologists believe compelling evidence points to an animal origin.” He added that it is “entirely possible” that the origins of Covid-19 will never be conclusively determined.
Several of the witnesses criticised the delayed investigation into the pandemic’s origins and the lack of a bipartisan investigative committee.
“It is inconceivable that over three years after this deadly pandemic began, no comprehensive and unfettered investigation into pandemic origins has been carried out, nor is one currently planned,” Metzl said. “This injustice is an insult to every victim of this crisis and a clear threat to future generations.”
Metzl blamed obstruction by the Chinese government as the “primary reason there has been no comprehensive investigation into Covid-19,” saying that it “has destroyed samples, hidden records, imprisoned brave Chinese journalists, gagged Chinese scientists [and] actively spread misinformation.”
However, he added that it is also necessary to “carefully examine our own behaviour and that of our friends and allies.”
Metzl called for “establishing a bipartisan US national Covid-19 commission to examine the origins issue as well as other failings and shortcomings,” suggesting it could be modelled after the 9/11 Commission.
Auwaerter agreed that “an independent body would make the most sense,” while Redfield said the answer ultimately “will come from the intelligence community,” adding his view that “declassification is very important.”
Wenstrup said the subcommittee sent letters of inquiry to several government departments and key figures, including Fauci, the US Department of Health and Human Services and the White House, in addition to letters sent recently to the respective heads of the US State Department, FBI and DOE.
“This is a national security issue. This is a national health issue,” said Wenstrup,” adding: “Discovering the origins is vital. It matters for the future of the world, and we aren’t finished. We’re just beginning. There will be more hearings and more inquiries and more documents discovered, and we will follow every lead.”
- A Tell / The Defender report / By Michael Nevradakis, a senior reporter for The Defender