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A U.S.-Funded Lab Origin of COVID-19 Would Be the Most Significant Case of Governmental Gross Negligence in History

by Jeffrey D. Sachs
21 March 2024 7:00 PM

The U.S. Government (USG) funded and supported a programme of dangerous laboratory research that may have resulted in the creation and accidental laboratory release of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic. Following the outbreak, the USG lied in order to cover up its possible role. The U.S. Government should correct the lies, find the facts and make amends with the rest of the world.

A group of intrepid truth-seekers — journalists, scientists, whistleblowers — have uncovered a vast amount of information pointing to the likely laboratory origin of SARS-CoV-2. Most important has been the intrepid work of the the Intercept and U.S. Right to Know (USRTK), especially investigative reporter Emily Kopp at USRTK.

Based on this investigative work, the Republican-led House Committee on Oversight and Accountability is now carrying out an important investigation in a Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic. In the Senate, the leading voice for transparency, honesty and reason in investigating the origin of SARS-Cov-2 has been Republican Senator Rand Paul.

The evidence of a possible laboratory creation revolves around a multi-year U.S.-led research program that involved U.S. and Chinese scientists. The research was designed by U.S. scientists, funded mainly by the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the Department of Defence, and administered by a U.S. organisation, the EcoHealth Alliance (EHA), with much of the work taking place at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV).

The U.S. owes the full truth, and perhaps ample financial compensation, to the rest of the world, depending on what the facts ultimately reveal.

Here are facts that we know as of today.

First, the NIH became the home for biodefence research starting in 2001. In other words, the NIH became a research arm of the military and intelligence communities. Biodefence funding from the Defence Department budget went to Dr. Anthony Fauci’s division, the National Institute for Allergies and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).

Second, NIAID and DARPA (in the Defence Department) supported extensive research on potential pathogens for biowarfare and biodefence, 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 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 U.S. 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 Centres 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 U.S. 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 U.S. Government’s Defence 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 U.S. scientists would “freak out” if they learned of U.S. Government support for GoF research at WIV in a BSL2 facility.

Eighth, the Defence 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 programme.

Ninth, when the outbreak was first noted in Wuhan in late 2019 and January 2020, key U.S. 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 1st 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 U.S. officials began to point their fingers at WIV as the source of the laboratory leak while hiding the NIH-funding and EHA-led research programme 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 U.S. 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 realised 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 U.S. funded and implemented a dangerous GoF research programme 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 U.S.-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 U.S. Government continues to this day to fund dangerous GoF work as part of its biodefense programme. The U.S. 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 U.S. 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.

Jeffrey D. Sachs is a University Professor and Director of the Centre for Sustainable Development at Columbia University, where he directed The Earth Institute from 2002 until 2016. He is also President of the UN Sustainable Development Solutions Network. He has been adviser to three United Nations Secretaries-General, and currently serves as an SDG Advocate under Secretary-General Antonio Guterres. This article was first published by Common Dreams.

Tags: Anthony FauciChinaCover-upCovid originsEcoHealth AllianceLab leakPeter DaszakUnited StatesWuhan Institute of Virology

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21 Comments
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Mogwai
Mogwai
1 year ago

Well I don’t know about any super deadly virus but footballers are still falling victim to ‘Climate Change’. Live on air too, apparently;

”Wow! 3rd footballer collapsed on live TV this week!

30 year old Egyptian National Footballer Ahmed Refaat collapsed on the pitch during a match between his club Modern Future FC and Ittihad.

The Egyptian international suffered a cardiac arrest and was taken to hospital. After an hour, his heart started beating again.

Club’s medical supervisors claimed doctors hadn’t seen something like it before.”

https://twitter.com/_aussie17/status/1770443047454855280

43
-1
transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago

Sorry, what is this “covid 19 pandemic”?

Whatever the origins, and regardless of whether it’s even a novel pathogen or whether viruses exist at all in the way they are portrayed, the “covid” scam globally with all the lockdowns, withdrawal of medical care, dodgy “vaccines” etc etc is much more than “gross negligence”. I have flip flopped on this but my views on the “origin” “story” are tending towards thinking it’s at this stage a luxury distraction from the “why” and “how” of the “covid” reaction by governments and others worldwide, in lockstep.

69
-2
Monro
Monro
1 year ago

The world requires answers.

The question that I have is why?

What would be the point of developing a common cold coronavirus in a laboratory when at least four are already out there in circulation, at least one of which probably hopped from animals to humans?

24
0
transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago
Reply to  Monro

More to the point, why turn the world upside down for something that wasn’t dangerous, regardless of where it came from?

49
-1
Jon Garvey
Jon Garvey
1 year ago
Reply to  transmissionofflame

Well they have turned the world upside down for a 1 degree natural rise in temperature, so they are well used to capitalising on non-crises.

68
0
Monro
Monro
1 year ago
Reply to  transmissionofflame

Incompetence or venality, or both. Farrar, who knew not much, gave a press conference (circa 24 Jan. I think) at Davos where he pretty much said that the new coronavirus was as dangerous as SARS but a great deal more infectious, palpable nonsense in terms of its CFR, as was clear certainly by 06 Feb 2020. They needed to bounce some vaccine development funding out of the U.S.

The result? PANIC! (and vaccine funding!)

Last edited 1 year ago by Monro
32
0
transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago
Reply to  Monro

They knew it wasn’t dangerous early on

38
-1
Monro
Monro
1 year ago
Reply to  transmissionofflame

Can you evidence that?

2
-16
transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago
Reply to  Monro

Well I knew

28
0
Monro
Monro
1 year ago
Reply to  transmissionofflame

You knew by 24 Jan 2020? Good effort!

This was what Farrar and colleagues said at Davos 24 Jan 2020:

‘It is not SARS. The virus is in a similar family as SARS but this looks different … and the difference is probably it is easier to pass between human beings. I think we can expect many more cases in China and many more cases in other parts of the world.’
 
Richard then emphasised how much was unknown, such as how infectious the virus was; the pattern of transmission; the range of symptoms and whether they ran from mild to severe; the exact number of cases; how far it had spread geographically’

Last edited 1 year ago by Monro
5
-15
transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago
Reply to  Monro

I wrote early on, not necessarily immediately

12
-1
Monro
Monro
1 year ago
Reply to  transmissionofflame

The reason I ask about evidence (genuine question) is simply because, if you are correct and can evidence that Farrar and co. knew early on covid was simply another common cold coronavirus, then they could be held to account.

Certainly they should have known by 06 February but they, of course, maintain that they did not, and, indeed, still believe that covid really did cause a ‘pandemic’.

Farrar’s own account to the inquiry, needless to say, appears to back that up.

Last edited 1 year ago by Monro
4
0
transmissionofflame
transmissionofflame
1 year ago
Reply to  Monro

At some point between February and March there was enough data from the Diamond Princess to see that this wasn’t in the same ballpark as SARS.

But in a way “evidence” seems irrelevant to me. Repeating as they do to this day that there was a deadly pandemic that required extraordinary measures, which in combination with the “vaccine” saved us from disaster, to me seems like saying “black is white” because there is simply no evidence FOR that statement. I feel like I am in a parallel reality.

26
-1
Jon Garvey
Jon Garvey
1 year ago
Reply to  Monro

Is it not possible that those like Farrar, who were in the know about the research, and put two and two together about the leak (either accidental or above his paygrade if a deliberate release), would naturally assume that the attempt to build a deadly pathogen had actually produced a deadly pathogen?

In that case, their impossible task would have appeared to be to keep the lab origin secret at all costs, and to put the genie back in the bottle with vaccines etc at all costs.

The consequence was that a bug that would scarcely have been noticed (because their research was crap) actually became a global disaster because of the response, all designed to protect the deep state and their own backs.

22
0
Sforzesca
Sforzesca
1 year ago
Reply to  Monro

Bioweapon research alied to research on “viruses” in order to help mankind develop a vaccine to enable all humanity to become immune to the virus which the bioweapon lab er, may have created in the first place.

An alternative view is that viruses, ie random? chains of nucleotides do not exist in the sense that they actually cause disease – as drilled into all medics, the MSM and governments by bigpharma courtesy of Pasteur and the Rockefellers. All illnesses and disease may merely be cellular housekeeping necessitated by stress, pollution, age and just living in an ever increasing chemical world. Oh, and being vaccinated in the first place.

Nothing sells better than the lure of a cure to disease.
Lots and lots of money to be made.
Bastard Snake Oil Salesmen, but very rich and powerful are they.

24
-1
kev
kev
1 year ago
Reply to  Monro

Cui Bono!

It had to be “novel” so they could ban Ivermectin and HCQ, allowing them to declare their “vaccines” Emergency Use Authorisation. So the aim appears to be an excuse to, as Gates declared in 2014 (TED talk), vaccinate the world.

But why? Sure Big Pharma makes $Billions in profit, but why did (do) they want to inject everyone with their experimental mRNA product? If it changes everyone’s DNA, then (conspiracy alert) do the injected become some kind of Human 2.0, a genetically modified transhuman that is “owned” by the mRNA manufacturers?

This is pure conjecture, but there has to be some reason behind what they did.

10
0
kev
kev
1 year ago
Reply to  kev

Here are some possible reasons why.

1.To vaccinate the entire population, as suggested by Bill Gates in a 2104 TED talk, but to what end?

a. To kill and main a proportion of the population

b. To create some kind of chemical dependency

c. To create an endless revenue stream for the Big Pharma companies

d. To compromise the innate immune system, to make the vaccinated more susceptible to disease, leading to a future dependency on pharmaceutical drugs

e. To introduce some foreign agent, as yet undisclosed – graphene, nano-lipids, nanoparticles

2. To introduce a vaccine passport system, whereby people can be punished, excluded or fined for failure to keep up to date with their “required” boosters and vaccinations

3. To introduce a China style social credit system, whereby peoples movements, and other aspects of their lives can be controlled, a natural extension to item 2.

4. Use the fear generated to control the populations, allowing the implementation of Agenda 2030, Zero carbon goals, the WEF Great Reset and Build Back Better initiatives, 15 minute cities.

5. Introduce CBDC’s and usher in the cashless society, tied in neatly to items 2, 3 and 4.

6. Leading to “You’ll own nothing, and you’ll be happy” and you will do exactly what you are told, when you are told without question. Failure to comply will mean total exclusion from society or movement to a death camp (potentially).

7. Alternatively, this could be just part of the wider Climate Emergency agenda, to allow lockdowns and other measures to be introduced to combat Climate Change – which always means Manmade Climate Change.

Last edited 1 year ago by kev
3
0
Brett_McS
Brett_McS
1 year ago

The virus wasn’t the cause of the problem; the government power grab using the virus as an excuse was the disaster. This ‘virus origin’ obsession is a distraction.

75
-3
Jon Garvey
Jon Garvey
1 year ago
Reply to  Brett_McS

No – not a distraction because it is how they planned the power grab. It’s the same calculus as knowing that NATO and the military industrial complex is exploiting the Ukraine war because they engineered it in the first place.

It’s the modus operandi, which is good to know: are the powers exploiting the fact of anthropogenic climate change for gain of wealth and power, or did they not engineer the “fact” in the first place? Are they exploiting an escalating financial crisis to gain control, or engineering it? The difference matters.

25
0
Jimbo G
Jimbo G
1 year ago

Not if the outcome was the US Government’s intent to destroy individual liberty. The panic and total failure of governments worldwide to maintain a modicum of critical thought and conservatism has ushered-in a new global authoritarian age and probably new Dark Age. The Enlightenment is clearly toast and unreason/madness mounts.

Last edited 1 year ago by Jimbo G
19
0
RTSC
RTSC
1 year ago

I can well imagine the following conversation:

Fauci to Shi Zhengli at Wuhan “did the virus escape from the Wuhan lab?”

Shi Zhengli to Fauci “probably, but if you point the finger at us, we will announce who funded the research.”

Both “if one hangs, we both do….. so we must lie.”

19
0

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