Fauci defends US-funded coronavirus research in Wuhan

• Dr. Anthony Fauci, the director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, defended the US-funded coronavirus research at a Wuhan lab.
• The research looks into whether bat coronaviruses could be transmitted to humans.
• Fauci explained that it would have been “negligent” not to look into it to prevent it from happening again.

Dr. Anthony Fauci defended the US-funded coronavirus research at a Wuhan lab, pointing out that it would have been “negligent” not to do so. The research, for which the US provided hundreds of thousands of dollars, studies whether bat coronaviruses could be transmitted to humans.

During an interview with CNN anchor Jake Tapper on “State of the Union,”, Fauci stated, “It was a… proposal that was peer-reviewed and given a very high rating for the importance of why it should be done.”

He explained, “[The proposal was] to be able to go and do a survey of what was going on among the bat population because everyone in the world was trying to figure out what the original source of the original SARS CoV-1 was.”

According to the New York Post, the National Institutes of Health earmarked $600,000 for a nonprofit linked to Wuhan Institute of Virology. It was this lab that has been the topic of lab-leak theories regarding the origin of the COVID-19 pandemic.

The director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases argued that such research was necessary, saying, “It was almost as if you didn’t pursue that research you would be negligent because you were trying to find out how you could prevent this from happening again.”

Fauci explained that the research had to be undertaken in China since it was where SARS first emerged.

He pointed out, “If we were starting to look for bats in Secaucus, New Jersey, or Fairfax County, Virginia, it wouldn’t contribute very much to the standing of where SARS COV-1 originated.”

Source: New York Post