Fact Sheet: Activity at the Wuhan Institute of Virology

Something can be both propaganda and factually accurate at the same time. There is no such thing as a neutral source. When it comes to China, if it's not the CCP party line then it's probably relayed through Falun Gong affiliated media.

> This is a farrago of rumour and hearsay.

I disagree. I can see two unsupported claims here:

"The U.S. government has reason to believe that several researchers inside the WIV became sick in autumn 2019, before the first identified case of the outbreak, with symptoms consistent with both COVID-19 and common seasonal illnesses."

"Despite the WIV presenting itself as a civilian institution, the United States has determined that the WIV has collaborated on publications and secret projects with China’s military."

These may be true or not, but the evidence is not presented.

All other points raised are either opinion or facts that have been known to the public for a long time.

Don't post political conjectures, which are purely diplomatic traps

Obviously it is possible this was a leak from a lab working on bats and coronaviruses. Zero Hedge was banned from Twitter for speculating about this under the flimsy excuse of “doxxing” a publicly-listed contact for the head of the Wuhan lab conducting coronavirus work, but they were right to suggest the possibility. After all, there have been several examples of governments covering up incidents like this, and we usually only find out years later when the evidence eventually piles up or a brave witness/whistleblower finally speaks up. See https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sverdlovsk_anthrax_leak for such an example.

COVID has been a huge benefit to China ultimately. They have gained significantly on relative terms while everyone who has a less authoritarian form of governance (like the US and Europe) has lost. This was helped in part by the CCP’s cover up and suppression of journalists reporting about the coronavirus (https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/02/08/8037667...). That costed the rest of the world valuable time in learning about the virus, in preparing for it, and so forth. China should have voluntarily shut down all their ports much earlier to contain the virus. Instead they sat on this information, didn’t close their ports at all (waiting instead on other countries to deny traffic), and quietly hoarded supplies like PPE while no one knew any better. In the end, the CCP managed to dodge responsibility for this cover up and inaction, and instead recently jailed the brave journalist who reported on the virus for four years (https://www.scmp.com/news/china/politics/article/3117734/no-...). What a gross injustice.

And then there’s the fact that repeated requests to visit the Wuhan lab have been denied, and even a general visit by the WHO to explore the origins of the virus have been denied, even as late as this month (https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-china-55555466). This WHO a team was finally allowed in this week but with a whole year having passed, I’m sure any evidence that could implicate the Wuhan lab of a leak, accidental or otherwise, will have been erased.

Is there ANY reason to trust the CCP or cut them any slack on this issue? I feel like the main reason news media and individuals on social media pushed back on such speculation, on the casting of blame on China, and on referring to the virus by location, was simply due to their distaste for Trump and their willingness to attack him at any opportunity.

After repeatedly denying access to the WHO team, they were finally allowed in over a year later. That doesn’t seem suspicious at all...

Why do you think there is a virology lab looking at zoonotic diseases in Wuhan? Is it not likely that a high prevalence of zoonotic disease there, historically, has led to specific interest? Why is the Durham county hospital causing all this coal miners black lung disease!

Why does the Liverpool school of tropical hygiene and medicine cause this huge spike in non indigenous malaria!

Seriously: the wuhan virology lab is there, because the problem is there.