Unraveling China's COVID Origins Deception

• FBI director confirms lab leak responsible for spreading deadly Coronavirus
• China has rebuffed an open and honest probe of the origins of the virus
• Inspector General report exposes NIH lax oversight of Wuhan lab research 
• Dr. Anthony Fauci owes a full explanation for grants to Wuhan facility

The pandemic ushered in unprecedented censorship of opinions about Coronavirus origins. No one was allowed to question the official government version that the deadly virus spread from animals to humans. Now there are growing questions about the hypothesis and its leading advocate Dr. Anthony Fauci.

It is about time for a thorough investigation after the virus ravaged the globe, killing 6.87 million people, including 1.1 million Americans.

Conventional wisdom about the virus recently was upended by The Wall Street Journal, citing a classified report by the Energy Department. The document expressed the viewpoint that the virus likely leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China.   

Defensive administration officials were quick to point out the Energy Department's assessment was made with "low confidence." National Security Adviser Jake Sullivan rushed to the microphones to assure there is "no definitive answer" that the pandemic can be traced to a lab leak in China.

Then FBI Director Christopher Wray dropped a bombshell that detonated the administration's attempt to preserve the natural origin thesis.  "The FBI has for quite some time now assessed that the origins of the pandemic are most likely a potential lab incident in Wuhan," the director said in a television interview. 

For three years, Dr. Fauci and the World Health Organization (WHO) have collaborated to advance the theory that the virus spread to humans from animals, likely bats, at a market in Wuhan.  China promoted this version while stiff arming an independent, scientific investigation into the origin.

WHO officials were bullied by China into accepting the Communist theory. There was a hurried probe by an international group of experts, working alongside Chinese health officials.  The controversial study published in 2021 became the official thesis under pining the Chinese version.

In June of last year the WHO recommended further investigation into the possibility of a lab leak, marking a seismic shift from its earlier stance.  Under withering criticism, the world organization admitted the original finding had been "premature," asserting it could not rule out the lab leak version. 

China slammed the world organization and withdrew its collaboration with the group. In his interview, Wray took note of China's lack of cooperation and observed the Chinese government "has been doing its best to try to thwart, and obfuscate" a legitimate investigation into the role of the Wuhan lab. 

A State Department fact-sheet on its website minces no words on in assessing the Chinese government's role in a coverup:

"...The Chinese Communist Party has systematically prevented a transparent and thorough investigation of the COVID-19 pandemic's origin, choosing instead to devote enormous resources to deceit and disinformation."

The State Department verified it had reason to believe that several researchers inside the Wuhan lab became sick with COVID in the autumn of 2019, before the first identified case of the outbreak.  This raises questions about Wuhan officials public claims there were "zero infections" among its staff.

Despite mounting evidence of a lab leak, Dr. Fauci claims there is no data to support such a thesis. He knows global health authorities have been prevented from interviewing Wuhan researchers. He also fails to mention there is no credible, independent data to support the animal to human theory either. 

Early in the pandemic a Senate Committee disclosed internal emails showing Dr. Fauci was informed by senior scientists at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) that a natural origin was "highly unlikely." Dr. Fauci was director of the National Institute of Allergy & Infectious Diseases (NIAID) at the NIH. 

Perhaps, Dr. Fauci was protecting his reputation. As NIAID director, Dr. Fauci administered  grants totaling $2.57 million to the EcoHealth Alliance, a New York based nonprofit research group.  An estimated $1.8 million wound up funding research at the Wuhan research facility.  

What is indisputable is that the Wuhan lab engaged in "gain of function" research designed to replicate a virus to increase its virulence and transmissibility to humans.  Dr. Fauci has vociferously denied that American taxpayer dollars were used for "gain of function" experiments. 

Dr. Peter Daszak, a British zoologist who runs EcoHealth, has emerged as a central figure in the "gain of function" controversy.  He has been a target of recent Congressional inquiries for his role in overseeing the funding of the Wuhan lab, while tacitly supporting the research at the government facility.  

The office of Inspector General for the Department of Homeland Security audited the grants made by NIH to EcoHealth and issued a scathing 64-page report on January 25.  The document excoriates confusing protocols, misspent funds and monitoring of the potentially risky pathogens studied. 

The inspector general's audit found that the NIH "did not refer the research to HHS (Health & Human Services) for an outside review for enhanced potential pandemic pathogens" after a grant to the Wuhan lab.  Here are three key sentences from the OIG report:

"We found that NIH was only able to conclude that research resulted in virus growth that met specified benchmarks based on a late progress report from EcoHealth that NIH failed to follow up on until nearly two years after the due date.

"Based on these finding, we conclude that the NIH missed opportunities to more effectively monitor research.  With improved oversight, NIH may have been able to take more timely corrective actions to mitigate the inherent risks associated with this type of research.

"WIV's lack of cooperation following the COVID 19 outbreak limited EcoHealth's ability to monitor" how the funds were used by the Chinese facility.

In plain language: The NIH failed to supervise the administration of taxpayer money given to EcoHealth for pathogen research at the Wuhan lab.  That may explain why Dr. Fauci has stubbornly clung to the thesis that the global plague was transmitted naturally from animals to humans. 

Past censorship allowed China to escape culpability. Now there is a moral and scientific imperative for Congress and public health authorities to determine the full extent of China's complicity in covering up the origins of one of the deadliest pandemics in modern history.