This story is, unsurprisingly, mostly being ignored by most of the big media players, because they need to protect China, I guess. Or, is it that they do not want to give credence to a Trump and MAGA theory? Because TDS? Or, are they just not wanting to engage in speculation and “conspiracy theories”, despite constantly engaging in them against Trump?
Intelligence on sick staff at Wuhan lab fuels debate on COVID-19 origin
Three researchers from China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology became sick enough in November 2019 that they sought hospital care, according to a previously undisclosed U.S. intelligence report that could add weight to growing calls for a fuller probe of whether the COVID-19 virus may have escaped from the laboratory.
The details of the reporting go beyond a State Department fact sheet, issued during the final days of the Trump administration, which said that several researchers at the lab, a center for the study of coronaviruses and other pathogens, became sick in autumn 2019 “with symptoms consistent with both COVID-19 and common seasonal illness.”
The disclosure of the number of researchers, the timing of their illnesses and their hospital visits come on the eve of a meeting of the World Health Organization’s decision-making body, which is expected to discuss the next phase of an investigation into COVID-19’s origins.
Current and former officials familiar with the intelligence about the lab researchers expressed differing views about the strength of the supporting evidence for the assessment. One person said that it was provided by an international partner and was potentially significant but still in need of further investigation and additional corroboration.
Another person described the intelligence as stronger. “The information that we had coming from the various sources was of exquisite quality. It was very precise. What it didn’t tell you was exactly why they got sick,” he said, referring to the researchers.
November 2019 is roughly when many epidemiologists and virologists believe SARS-CoV-2, the virus behind the pandemic, first began circulating around the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where Beijing says that the first confirmed case was a man who fell ill on Dec. 8, 2019.
Is this something, or just a cause of correlation isn’t causation? A bit of serendipity?
The Biden administration declined to comment on the intelligence but said that all technically credible theories on the origin of the pandemic should be investigated by the WHO and international experts.
This would be the same WHO which protected China through most of the pandemic, right? Not like there will be much cooperation from China to start with. They have been less than forthcoming since this started, and were just fine with Democrats Blaming Trump. They aren’t going to start cooperating now. Does China Joe actually want answers which could hurt the amount of money he and his kids have made from China?
So in a period of 3 months 3 people working at that lab came down with symptoms similar to the flu and/or covid
Were any symptoms severe enough to require overnight hospitalization?
After looking at pics of the lab complex I would guess 100 people work there
Who might consider 3 to be a number higher than normal?
Trach did you bother to check on how many work there?
John,
If you don’t know something, don’t comment. Of course that would essentially shut you up.
The lab is a viral lab, they handle the worse viruses on the planet. They are also a weapons lab so they have stuff you have never, ever seen. Their infection rate is zero, unless they desire to spread the virus, which they did.
William Teach trots out his “the media ignores it” trope as evidence that something must be “there”. Of course the story was reported by the news division of the WSJ on May 23 (yesterday) and picked up by CNN, The Guardian and the usual right-wing sources that never do their own investigations. It could be that more prudent journalistic sources take a little time to investigate.
Three employees at the lab got sick during cold and flu season. Three ill out of how many? Is it possible they caught a disease outside the facility and brought it in?
If I was running a secret bioweapons lab developing worldwide pandemics I might think to vaccinate my workers, but I’m not a conservablogger.