Fauci Says Coronavirus Wasn’t Created in Wuhan Lab Despite 'Enormous Evidence'
Fauci's claims puts him at odds with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo
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Director of the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, Dr. Anthony Fauci, said the notion that the Chinese coronavirus was created in a Wuhan laboratory is "not likely," despite Secretary of State Mike Pompeo saying there was "enormous Evidence."
In an interview with the National Geographic published Monday, Fauci said:
“If you look at the evolution of the virus in bats and what’s out there now, [the scientific evidence] is very, very strongly leaning toward this could not have been artificially or deliberately manipulated."
“Everything about the stepwise evolution over time strongly indicates that [this virus] evolved in nature and then jumped species,” he added.
Fauci pushed back on speculation that the disease was brought into the lab from the wild and later escaped by mistake.
But Pompeo on Monday said the government now has "enormous evidence" that the global coronavirus pandemic originated in a lab.
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"There's enormous evidence that that's where this began," Pompeo said on ABC's This Week.
"We've said from the beginning that this was a virus that originated in Wuhan, China," he continued.
"We took a lot of grief for that from the outset, but I think the whole world can see now."
In April, President Donald Trump vowed to "find out" whether the deadly COVID-19 leaked from a lab, indicating a high degree of confidence it did.
“I think that the World Health Organization should be ashamed of themselves because they’re like the public relations agency for China.”
Dr. Fauci just helped China cover up this terrible coronavirus crime
— Neon Nettle (@NeonNettle) May 5, 2020
READ MORE: https://t.co/gRNrSwmlMN
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“They shouldn’t be making excuses when people make horrible mistakes, especially mistakes that are causing hundreds of thousands of people around the world to die,” he added.
“I think the World Health Organization should be ashamed of themselves.”
As Neon Nettle reported last month, Fauci had previously backed funding for the Wuhan laboratory in China, which was studying the coronavirus in bats.
The news broke after reports revealed Barack Obama's National Institutes of Health (NIH) sent $3.7 million grant to the Wuhan Institute of Virology in 2015.
Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases gave $7.4 million to the Wuhan Institute of Virology lab, according to Newsweek.
The funding for the lab was shut down by The National Institutes of Health last week.
U.S. officials uncovered evidence the coronavirus came from the same Wuhan lab, but China laid the blame on wet markets.
The coronavirus was reportedly part of China’s effort to demonstrate its ability to identify and combat viruses was equal to or greater than the US.
Citing "multiple sources who have been briefed on the details of early actions by China’s government," Fox revealed that the "initial transmission of the virus was bat-to-human, and that ‘patient zero’ worked at the laboratory, then went into the population in Wuhan.”
