The Anatomy of A Cover Up: Congress Releases Interim Report on Covid Origins
BECKER NEWS
The House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic on Tuesday released its interim report on the efforts of U.S. public health officials and their international associates to cover up the origins of the novel coronavirus known as SARS-CoV-2.
According to the subcommittee authors, led by Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-OH), the actions of scientific researchers, in consultation with public health officials like Dr. Anthony Fauci, the former Director of the National Institute for Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Francis Collins, the former Director of the National Institutes of Health, and Sir Jeremy Farrar, the former director of the Wellcome Trust and now chief scientist at the World Health Organization, skewed the results of its medical research on the virus’s origins to discredit the view that it was likely from a laboratory leak as that of a “conspiracy theory.”
Dr. Anthony Fauci – Dr. Francis Collins
This was intended to cover-up the likelihood that the virus had mutated as the result of gain-of-function research, or alternatively, serial passage among laboratory animals, and had escaped the lab, even if it had happened unintentionally, the subcommittee authors argued.
“The goal of Proximal Origin was not to discover the origin of COVID-19 nor protect from future pandemics, but, instead, to disprove the lab leak theory,” the report states. “On two separate occasions, Dr. [Kristian] Andersen stated just that.”
“First, on February 8, 2020, Dr. Andersen wrote, ‘“Our main work over the past couple of weeks has been focused on trying to disprove any type of lab theory, but we are a crossroad where the scientific evidence isn’t conclusive enough to say that we have high confidence in any of the three main theories considered’,” the report continued.
“Second, on February 20, 2020, Dr. Andersen—in trying to defend the viability of Proximal Origin—wrote, ‘Unfortunately none of this helps refute a lab origin and the possibility must be considered as a serious scientific theory (which is what we do) and not dismissed out of hand as another ‘conspiracy’ theory. We all really, really wish that we could do that (that’s how this got started), but unfortunately its just not possible given the data’,” the report noted.
The subcommittee then laid out one of the most persuasive motives for the effort to dissuade people from believing that the virus’s origins may have stemmed from a lab leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China.
“Dr. [Andrew] Rambaut, on February 2, 2020, communicating over a private Slack channel with Drs. Andersen, Holmes, and Garry, wrote, ‘given the sh*t show that would happen if anyone serious accused the Chinese of even accidental release, my feeling is we should say that given there is no evidence of a specifically engineered virus, we cannot possibly distinguish between natural evolution and escape so we are content with ascribing it to natural process’,” the report noted.
“In response to Dr. Rambaut’s message above, Dr. Andersen replied, ‘Yup, I totally agree that that’s a very reasonable conclusion. Although I hate when politics is injected into science – but its impossible not to, especially given the circumstances‘,” it continued.
“Dr. [Ron] Fouchier, in emails following the February 1 conference call, stated, ‘…further debate about such accusations would unnecessarily distract top researchers from their active duties and do unnecessary harm to science in general and science in China in particular’,” the report continued.
“Dr. [Francis] Collins, in emails following the February 1 conference call, stated, ‘…the voices of conspiracy will quickly dominate, doing great potential harm to science and international harmony’,” the report added.
Throughout the drafting process, the authors of Proximal Origin were ‘keenly aware of the influence of Dr. Fauci, Dr. Collins, and Dr. Farrar,’ the subcommittee contended.
“Within hours of receiving the draft, Dr. Fauci clearly worried about the possibility of serial passage in animals in a lab and asked the whole group, ‘Would serial passage in an animal in the laboratory give the same result as prolonged adaption in animals in the wild? Or is there something that is fundamentally different in what happens when you serial passage versus natural animal adaption?’ Dr. [Robert] Garry responds, ‘It’s possible to fairly rapidly select for more pathogenic variants in the laboratory.’ Thus confirming Dr. Fauci’s fear of a potential lab leak,” the report states.
Critically, the subcommittee demonstrates that the infamous Proximal Origins paper rests on three highly flawed assumptions.
“The conclusions of Proximal Origin rest on three main arguments: (1) the presence of a non-optimal RBD and that RBD appearing in other viral sequences—particularly pangolins, (2) the presence or furin cleavage sites in other coronaviruses, and (3) the concept that any laboratory manipulation would have used an already published viral backbone.115 Each of these arguments is flawed and rests on unsupported assumptions,” the committee states.
In conclusion, the interim report calls the documentation of the Covid origins debate the “anatomy of a cover-up.”
“After publication, Proximal Origin was used to downplay the lab leak hypothesis and call those who believe it may be true conspiracy theorists. Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins tracked the paper through the review and publication process. And finally, Dr. Collins expressed dismay when Proximal Origin did not successfully kill the lab leak theory. He subsequently asked Dr. Fauci if there was anything more they could do. The next day, Dr. Fauci directly cited Proximal Origin from the White House podium,” the report noted.
“On January 31, 2020, Dr. Fauci prompted Proximal Origin, which’s goal was to ‘disprove’ the lab leak theory to avoid blaming China for the COVID-19 pandemic,” the report added. “Proximal Origin employed fatally flawed science to achieve its goal. And, finally, Dr. Collins and Dr. Fauci used Proximal Origin to attempt to kill the lab leak theory. This is the anatomy of a cover-up.”
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(TLB) published this article from Becker News as compiled and written by Kyle Becker
Header featured image (edited) credit: Fauci/Collins/org. BN article
Emphasis added by (TLB)
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