Photographer: Go Nakamura / Getty Images
Photographer: Go Nakamura / Getty Images
The State Department said Friday it had new information suggesting that the Covid-19 pandemic could have occurred in a Chinese laboratory and not through contact with infected animals, the latest rescue from the Trump administration’s efforts to put pressure on Beijing on the virus’s origins.
Specifically, the US said it had obtained new evidence that researchers at the Institute of Virology in Wuhan fell ill in the fall of 2019, before the first identified case of the outbreak in the surrounding city, with symptoms it said were consistent with either Covid-19 or common seasonal diseases.
The department said China’s lack of transparency about the origin of the pandemic more than a year ago, as well as efforts to mask early deficiencies in the country’s response to the outbreak, make it difficult to draw clear conclusions. But the brief, unsigned statement issued by the United States – less than a week before the end of the Trump administration – did not provide data to support his claims.
“The virus could have emerged naturally from human contact with infected animals, spreading in a pattern compatible with a natural epidemic,” according to the State Department. Alternatively, a laboratory accident could resemble a natural outbreak if the initial exposure included only a few individuals and was aggravated by an asymptomatic infection.
A State Department spokesman declined to elaborate when asked for further comments.
China has repeatedly denied allegations that the virus could have appeared in a laboratory. The US did not say how it obtained the new information about the diseases in the laboratory.
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The comments, in a State Department fact sheet, come at a time when China is facing criticism for initially preventing some members of a World Health Organization mission from entering China as part of an effort to trace the origin of Covid. -19, saying they did not pass health projections. While the experts were granted permission, China has already been criticized by the WHO for delaying the mission’s plans to visit the country.
China has been under scrutiny since the blast exploded in and around Wuhan, but the Trump administration has also sought to blame Beijing authorities after the pandemic hit the US and deaths rose. President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Michael Pompeo frequently refer to the disease as the “China virus,” the “China plague,” and the “Wuhan virus.”
In turn, China is organizing a campaign to question the virus originating inside its borders. State media have developed research that suggests there were cases in Italy and the US that predated Wuhan and suggested that the pathogen could have entered the country through frozen food or packaging.
On Friday, it was announced that 2 million people died worldwide due to the outbreak, with almost 400,000 deaths in the US