Tag: biological warfare

Fauci In 2012: Gain-Of-Function Research ‘Worth Risk Of Lab Accident Sparking Pandemic’

America’s top virologist, Anthony Fauci, argued in 2012 that the risks of a lab accident sparking a pandemic are outweighed by the potential benefits of manipulating viruses via gain-of-function research, according to previously unsurfaced remarks reported by Sharri Markson via The Australian.

“In an unlikely but conceivable turn of events, what if that scientist becomes infected with the virus, which leads to an outbreak and ultimately triggers a pandemic?” Fauci wrote in the American Society for Microbiology in 2012, adding “Many ask reasonable questions: given the possibility of such a scenario – however remote – should the initial experiments have been performed and/or published in the first place, and what were the processes involved in this decision?”

“Scientists working in this field might say – as indeed I have said – that the benefits of such experiments and the resulting knowledge outweigh the risks,” Fauci continued. “It is more likely that a pandemic would occur in nature, and the need to stay ahead of such a threat is a primary reason for performing an experiment that might appear to be risky.“

Keep reading

Unearthed Evidence Shows Fauci Defended ‘Integral’ Gain-Of-Function Research Despite Pandemic ‘Risks’.

Dr. Anthony Fauci appeared to defend gain-of-function research as “important” despite its pandemic “risk” in a 2012 paper exposed by The Australian. The National Pulse can also reveal similar comments from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases Director during a 2012 conference focused on the controversial form of research.

Hosted by the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the December event – “Gain-of-Function Research on HPAI H5N1 Viruses” – counted Fauci as a speaker during the introductory session.

The National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Director appears to defend gain-of-function research, which increases the virulence and lethality of infectious diseases, as “integral.” He also describes his agency as “the major funders of most but not all of these people” who carry out the form of research.

Keep reading

Former State Department Official Says Idea COVID-19 Emerged Naturally is “Ridiculous”

A former State Department official says that the idea the COVID-19 virus emerged naturally out of a zoonotic situation is “ridiculous.”

David Asher told Fox News that the scientific community consensus that the virus emerged in Wuhan as a result of a mutation in animals is completely inaccurate.

“We were finding that despite the claims of our scientific community, including the National Institutes of Health and Dr. Fauci’s NIAID organization, there was almost no evidence that supported a natural, zoonotic evolution or source of COVID-19,” said the former State Department official.

“The data disproportionately stacked up as we investigated that it was coming out of a lab or some supernatural source,” he added.

Keep reading

New York Times COVID Reporter Says It’s “Racist” To Discuss Wuhan Lab Leak Theory

A New York Times reporter who specializes in COVID-19 coverage tweeted that it was “racist” to even talk about the Wuhan lab leak theory.

The lab leak issue has received a wave of attention following the Biden’s administration’s announcement that a 90 day investigation would be conducted into its veracity.

The NYT itself also reported yesterday that the U.S. intelligence community has been sitting on a “raft” of evidence pertaining to the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

However, Apoorva Mandavilli, who in her bio says she reports for the NYT “mainly” on COVID, asserted in a tweet that even discussing the issue was “racist.”

“Someday we will stop talking about the lab leak theory and maybe even admit its racist roots. But alas, that day is not yet here,” tweeted Mandavilli.

Keep reading

Biden gives intel agencies 90 days to pinpoint Covid origins – after report he torpedoed Trump-era probe of Wuhan lab leak theory

President Joe Biden ordered a new analysis of how Covid-19 originated and said he will press China for transparency – one day after CNN reported that he killed a Trump-era probe into whether the virus started in a Wuhan lab.

“I have now asked the intelligence community to redouble their efforts to collect and analyze information that could bring us closer to a definitive conclusion and to report back to me in 90 days,” Biden said on Wednesday in a statement. He added that other agencies, including US National Labs, will contribute to the study, which may include “specific questions for China.”

Biden addressed the issue of how the pandemic began after CNN reported late Tuesday that his “team” shut down a State Department investigation that was launched last fall by former President Donald Trump’s administration to prove that the virus leaked from a Wuhan lab with links to the Chinese military. The article, which cited “sources familiar with the decision,” said there were concerns about the quality of evidence and possible “cherry-picking” of facts.

The Biden administration has faced increasing pressure over its efforts – or lack thereof – to investigate Covid-19’s origin after the Wuhan lab theory gained traction in recent days. Mainstream media outlets that had previously dismissed and mocked the Wuhan lab theory, such as the Washington Post, acknowledged in the past week that it had suddenly become “credible.”

On Tuesday, White House press secretary Jen Psaki reiterated that Washington is relying on the World Health Organization to oversee an international investigation into Covid-19’s origins. The WHO had previously echoed the Chinese Communist Party’s assertion that the virus spread naturally from animals to humans, and it dismissed the lab theory.

Keep reading

More Scientists Demand Lab Leak Investigation; Claim They Were Ostracised For Presenting Research Backing The Scenario

More prominent scientific figures have thrown their weight behind calls for investigating the lab leak theory as the cause of the coronavirus pandemic, with some revealing they were previously ostracised for presenting research that suggested the scenario was realistic.

The Daily Mail reports that British vaccine researcher and professor of oncology Angus Dalgleish struggled to find a publisher for his paper suggesting the virus’s spike protein contains artificially inserted sequences.

The report notes that the professor “said the research was shunned by the scientific community, who did not want to threaten China or be seen to be agreeing with President Donald Trump — who was a big advocate for the theory the virus was leaked from a lab at the time.”

Dalgleish noted in an interview with the Times of London (paywall) that his research has led him to believe that “The changes [in the bat coronavirus] required to infect humans are extremely unlikely to have occurred naturally.”

“I was basically ostracised. I was fearful — really frightened by the way I was being treated. I was told I was not an expert on coronaviruses and I should just shut up,” the professor claimed.

He added that he and his research team “couldn’t believe people with whom we’d collaborated and published papers with in the past would shun us — I was warned I was out of my depth and I shouldn’t get into this and I’d make a fool of myself.”

In addition, yet more scientific figures have demanded that the lab leak theory be investigated, with professor of clinical microbiology at the University of Cambridge Ravi Gupta noting that the scenario has not been ‘adequately explored’.

Keep reading

Facebook no longer treating ‘man-made’ Covid as a crackpot idea

Facebook will no longer take down posts claiming that Covid-19 was man-made or manufactured, a company spokesperson told POLITICO on Wednesday, a move that acknowledges the renewed debate about the virus’ origins.

A narrative in flux: Facebook’s policy tweak arrives as support surges in Washington for a fuller investigation into the origins of Covid-19 after the Wall Street Journal reported that three scientists at the Wuhan Institute of Virology were hospitalized in late 2019 with symptoms consistent with the virus. The findings have reinvigorated the debate about the so-called Wuhan lab-leak theory, once dismissed as a fringe conspiracy theory.

Keep reading

Biden team shut down State Dept. inquiry probing possible lab link to COVID

The Biden administration ended an inquiry into a possible connection between the origins of the novel coronavirus and a lab in Wuhan, a CNN report published Tuesday claims.

The State Department launched the previously undisclosed inquiry last fall under President Donald Trump — but the effort was shut down this spring because of “concerns about the quality of its work,” CNN reported, citing three unnamed sources.

Allies of Mike Pompeo, Trump’s secretary of state, were looking into the possibility that the coronavirus pandemic may have started in the Wuhan Institute of Virology and not in nature, CNN reported.

But after the changeover in administrations, concerns were raised early in 2021 about draft findings of the probe shared with Biden’s team, CNN said.

The State Department confirmed to CNN that the inquiry had stopped but said it is continuing to work with other agencies on “COVID origins issues.”

Keep reading

Vox Stealth Edits March 2020 Article “Debunking” Lab Origin Of COVID

Left-wing website website Vox has been caught stealth editing an old article from March 2020 “debunking” the lab origin of COVID following numerous prominent officials now saying the lab origin is a distinct possibility.

Writer and investor Paul Graham documented the edits, tweeting, “Some of the stealth edits that Vox made to its article debunking “conspiracy theories” that Covid-19 originated in a lab leak between its original publication in March 2020 and now.”

The edits include removing the words that the virus definitively did “not come from the Wuhan lab” and saying that the fact the virus emerged in the same city in which the lab is located “appears to be pure coincidence” rather than the previously more definitive “is pure coincidence.”

Keep reading