'Scientists and journalists failed in their duty': National security experts blast New York Times and mainstream journalists for dismissing COVID-19 lab origins



A group of national security experts published a letter this week denouncing those in the mainstream media who downplayed, ignored, or outright denied the possibility that the COVID-19 virus originated in a Chinese communist lab in Wuhan.

The letter implicates news outlets like the New York Times and scientific journals such as the Lancet in an apparent campaign to censor or displace dissenting voices around the pandemic's origins.

Not only was journalists' and editors' failure to entertain the possibility that the Wuhan Institute of Virology — controlled by the genocidal Chinese regime and notorious for performing gain-of-function experiments on coronaviruses — a dereliction of duty, it "served to hamper national and international policy discussions about how to mitigate against future pandemics of any origin — natural, accidental, or deliberate."

Crystallizing public opinion

Forty-three national security experts, including House Foreign Affairs Committee Chair Michael McCaul (R-Texas), former Defense Intelligence Agency acting Director David Shedd, former national security adviser Robert O'Brien, and a host of former State Department and National Security Council officials, signed a Jan. 11 letter addressed to the editors of the Lancet, Nature Medicine, the New York Times, and Time magazine.

"From the beginning of the crisis, when the information environment was undoubtedly contentious, divisive, and confusing, some editors and reporters of news organizations and scientific publications stifled debate on the origins of the virus," said the letter.

The national security experts noted, "Some even leveled accusations of racism against those who sought in good faith to investigate whether the virus may have originated from a lab leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology."

New York Times global health and infectious diseases reporter Apoorva Mandavilli claimed in May 2021 that the lab-leak theory had "racist roots" and was not "plausible."

"Someday we will stop talking about the lab leak theory and maybe even admit its racist roots," she wrote. "But alas, that day is not yet here."

The letter notes that ideologically compromised journalists at the New York Times were not the only ones unwilling or unable to consider the possibility of a lab leak.

"Leading scientific journals censored dissenting voices; many science writers at major news outlets promoted narratives or asserted conclusions unsubstantiated by evidence; reporters failed to make even cursory attempts at surfacing potential conflicts of interest of their sources," said the letter.

These censorious and myopic efforts "served to hamper national and international policy discussions about how to mitigate against future pandemics of any origin — natural, accidental, or deliberate."

Failing America

The national security experts' letter noted that American security and prosperity depend upon "rigorous scientific debate, research, and scholarship, as well as an intrepid and independent news media."

Having failed in these regards, scientists and journalists who prematurely dismissed or stigmatized certain questions also "failed in their duty."

The letter's authors noted that the lab-leak theory has nevertheless survived these denunciations and dismissals to become widely recognized as a "legitimate possible explanation for the emergence of the pandemic."

The authors cite in their letter the June 9 World Health Organization Scientific Advisory Group for the Origins of Novel Pathogens report and various governmental inquiries as examples of the growing mainstream realization that human meddling or human error may ultimately have been responsible for the deaths over over 15 million human beings worldwide.

Republican members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence concluded in their December interim report that it was "plausible" that Chinese military researchers possessed the COVID-19 virus "as part of bioweapons research" prior to its release into the world as a consequence of a safety incident at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The report also lent far greater credibility to the lab-leak theory, which some House Republicans indicated many government officials, Big Tech platforms, and media outlets were quick to label a 'conspiracy theory.'"

A Republican Senate report published in October reaffirmed that China's Wuhan Institute of Virology, where coronavirus gain-of-function experiments had been conducted for years, is the likely "high-risk" source of the virus.

While the lab-leak theory has aged well, the New York Times' February amplification of a study that did not survive peer review hasn't. The Times platformed the suggestion that the virus originated in the wet market and failed to provide an update when other data showed that claim wanting.

In light of new reports about the plausibility of the lab-leak theory, the Lancet's featured March 7 open letter claiming that all but the natural origins theory constituted "misinformation" has also aged poorly.

The authors of the Lancet letter wrote, "We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin."

The national security experts' Jan. 11 letter calls for those who inadvertently worked to absolve the Chinese communist regime of possible guilt to be held accountable. Additionally it called on major news organizations "to carry out deeper investigations into the pandemic's origins, particularly by examining all credible origins hypotheses."

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House minority report: 'Plausible' that Chinese military possessed COVID-19 prior to pandemic 'as part of bioweapons research'



A congressional investigation into the origins of COVID-19 has raised the possibility that over 1 million Americans and tens of millions of people worldwide died as a result of bioweapons research conducted by elements of the Chinese military (the People's Liberation Army) with the help of U.S. federal grant money.

In their interim report released Wednesday, Republican members of the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence concluded that it is "plausible" that Chinese military researchers possessed the COVID-19 virus "as part of bioweapons research" prior to its release into the world as a consequence of a safety incident at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The report also suggested that there is "reason to believe that the [intelligence community] downplayed the possibility" that the virus was linked to China's bioweapons program.

What are the details?

Several House Republicans issued a joint statement on Wednesday, claiming the minority interim report's "findings identify more culpability from the Chinese Communist Party, highlight the failures of the Intelligence Community to share pertinent information with the American public and their authorized representatives, and give more credibility to the lab leak theory – which many government officials, Big Tech platforms, and media outlets were quick to label a 'conspiracy theory.'"

The minority report claimed that in "direct contrast to media skepticism in the early days of the pandemic, the scientific community now largely accepts as feasible that the COVID-19 pandemic may have emerged from a lab-related event involving Chinese scientist experimenting with coronaviruses."

On the basis of both classified and previously glossed-over declassified intelligence, "there are indications that SARS-CoV-2 may have been tied to China's biological weapons research program and spilled over to the human population during a lab-related incident at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV)."

According to the report, it is "plausible" that:

  • General Zhou Yusen's team of Academy of Military Medical Sciences Fifth Institute researchers "already possessed SARS-CoV-2 prior to the pandemic as part of bioweapons research";
  • this PLA-linked team "was working on vaccine-related experiments involving the virus at the WIV in 2019"; and
  • "a safety incident at the WIV led to its release into the world (presumably amplified by a super-spreader event at the Huanan Wet Market)."

Zhou, a Chinese military scientist, is said to have worked extensively on coronaviruses in concert with the WIV for years.

The Australian indicated that as "far back as 2004, the PLA-trained scientist was experimenting with spike proteins in coronaviruses – the point of their infectivity that is often subject to manipulation and gain-of-function research."

Prior to the pandemic, Zhou and other PLA researchers partnered with WIV scientists on a paper entitled, "Molecular Mechanism for Antibody-­Dependent Enhancement of Coronavirus Entry," submitted to the Journal of Virology on Nov. 27, 2019.

The New York Post reported that Zhou, who received funding from the National Institutes of Health, filed a patent for a COVID-19 vaccine in February 2020, prompting fears that "the shot was being studied even before the pandemic became public."

Zhou also happened to die under mysterious circumstances just months later. Despite having been a decorated PLA scientist, he received no posthumous tribute or award, which, according to the Post, amplified intrigue.

Not only has the Chinese Communist Party reportedly admitted that the AMMS — from which Zhou's Fifth Institute team hailed — conducts bioweapons research and coronavirus experiments, it has additional links to the Wuhan lab.

For instance, Colonel Cao Wuchun is listed on a number of WIV project reports as a researcher from the AMMS, reported the Daily Mail.

Although the committee now regards Chinese bioweapons research linked both to the AMMS and the WIV as a plausible cause of the pandemic, it "has not seen any indications that the Chinese military intentionally released SARS-CoV-2."

Committee member Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-Ohio) underscored that the report shows "how that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) bears more responsibility for the COVID-19 pandemic than what has been publicly known or transparently communicated to the American people."

The House Republicans Twitter account wrote, "In 19 days the new House Republican majority will hold Communist China accountable."

Intelligence community 'downplayed' China's potential responsibility

While the Chinese communist regime has unsurprisingly "not been transparent in sharing information," the report suggested that the American intelligence community, too, has "thus far failed to inform the public and failed to keep its Congressional oversight committees fully informed about what it knows."

Despite previous claims that the IC reached a "broad agreement" that COVID-19 was not developed as a bioweapon, the report contended that the IC had done so without rating its confidence in that assessment as it had with virtually every other claim in its declassified "Updated Assessment on COVID-19 Origins."

The IC document referenced in the report stated, "We remain skeptical of allegations that SARS-CoV-2 was a biological weapon because they are supported by scientifically invalid claims, their proponents do not have direct access to the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), or their proponents are suspected of spreading disinformation."

The minority report claimed the IC "has denied Congressional oversight of the analytic integrity of its Updated Assessment, particularly its heavy reliance on outside experts who may have had conflicts of interest."

The IC's skepticism might be based upon the counsel of "outside experts" who may be partly culpable for helping set the stage for the pandemic.

Since the IC reportedly failed to turn over its list of outside experts, it is presently unclear if the scientists the report claimed had funneled U.S. Department of Health and Human Services grant money to potential PLA bioweapons researchers at the AMMS Fifth Institute "were among the experts the IC consulted regarding COVID-19's origins."

According to the report, the IC "has ignored dozens of oral and written requests from Committee Members on the subject and to date has shown no interest in fully cooperating with the Committee."

Wenstrup said that by allegedly withholding "key information from the American public's authorized elected officials," the IC has deepened public mistrust.

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