LIVE: Select Subcommittee Hearing: Investigating Origins of COVID-19
Dr. Wenstrup [Chairman]: [This will be] an investigation based on facts, expert opinions, and without intentional, or unintentional bias.
Dr. Wenstrup [Chairman]: The genome of COVID-19 is inconsistent with expectations, and is unique for it's group of viruses. COVID-19 has both a binding domain, optimized for human cells, and a furin cleavage site, for a small part of the virus that makes it so infectious. That has never been seen before in a SARS-related virus. In other words, COVID-19 has unique characteristics that made it very infectious to humans. These have never been seen before in any other viruses of it's type.
Dr. Wenstrup [Chairman]: For some reason, that we do not yet know, leaders in the scientific community took action to attempt to convince the world that they should not take the lab leak theory seriously. Dr. Francis Collins stated he was more concerned with harm to international harmony, than he was with investigating the lab leak. Dr. Fauci said the lab leak theory was a shiny object that will go away in time. The president of EcoHealth, Dr. Peter Daszak, orchestrated a letter in the Lancet that called the lab leak a conspiracy theory, a statement that directly benefited Dr. Daszak himself.
Dr Ruiz [ranking member]: Today's hearing marks a concerning step down the path of letting extremism getting in the way of an inquiry that should be led by science and facts.
['doctor' panic, kek]
Mr. Wade: When the epidemic first broke out in December 2019, natural origin and lab leak were two equally reasonable explanations. But if the virus had emerged naturally, it should have left many tell-tale signs in the environment. None has yet appeared, despite the Chinese governments keen interest in finding them.
Mr. Wade: It's hard to believe that in the twilight of their long careers [Collins and Fauci], they would seriously mishandle an issue as important as the origin of the COVID virus. Yet that is what the evidence seems to point to.