CIA reveals what they think started Covid-19 pandemic
The Covid-19 pandemic was triggered by a leak from a Chinese lab, the CIA now believes.
It is the first time the American intelligence agency has settled on a stance about the origin of the virus that led to lockdowns worldwide at the beginning of the decade, NBC News reported.
Previously, it did not take a position on where the virus – which is responsible for more than seven million deaths – came from.
‘CIA assesses with low confidence that a research-related origin of the Covid-19 pandemic is more likely than a natural origin based on the available body of reporting,’ a spokesperson for the agency said.
‘CIA continues to assess that both research-related and natural origin scenarios of the Covid-19 pandemic remain plausible.’
The news emerged a day after John Radcliffe, the new director of the CIA, was confirmed.
Speaking on Friday, he said he believes US intelligence and science points to the origin of Covid being an accidental release, or ‘lab leak’, from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV), a research institution in the namesake Chinese city.
It is the location where the outbreak was first observed in late 2019.
The new assessment isn’t based on new information, but rather on a review of existing information, NBC News reported.
According to the broadcaster, the review started in the closing weeks of Joe Biden’s administration and was completed before Donald Trump took office on January 20.
The question of how Covid-19 developed has been long debated.
Some, including former National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases chief Anthony Fauci, believe it crossed over naturally to humans from bats or another intermediate species.
Meanwhile, there has been growing support for the theory that the virus was leaked from a Chinese lab.
This is supported by many in Donald Trump’s administration and staff for the House Committee for Government Oversight and Reform.
They believe it escaped from research activities in the region, citing the location of the outbreak, as well as US documents describing the work at WIV on similar viruses.
China has always denied that the pandemic was caused by a lab leak and insists it happened naturally.
The New York Times reported that the CIA believes China’s leadership doesn’t know and doesn’t want to know the origin of the virus.
The origin has significant implications for international relations with China, public health, and the future of virus research.
In 2021, the Office of the Director of National Intelligence, which oversees the CIA and 16 other federal intelligence agencies, released a report on its origins.
It said that four agencies believe with low confidence that the first infection was caused by natural exposure to an infected animal.
It added that one element believes it was the result of a laboratory incident related to experimentation or animal sampling or handling, with medium confidence.
Three agencies at the time said that they were unsure either way.
Last year, one of those agencies on the fence, the Energy Department, said that it now favoured a laboratory origin with low confidence.
The agency believes that the spill over could be related to research activities at the Wuhan Centre for Disease Control, a separate institution from WIV, according to the New York Times.
The CIA was also unsure at the time of the initial report, but with yesterday’s shift, it now favours a laboratory origin.
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