Letter Offers More Evidence of Wuhan Lab Project Source of COVID Pandemic

[Elderberry]

Legal Insurrection by Leslie Eastman 11/6/2021

Media pressure on Wuhan lab-linked scientist grows to testify before Congress.

A recently revealed letter is now being added to the pile of evidence that the origin of the SARS-CoV-2 virus that causes COVID-19 was a lab leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

    A letter from Lawrence Tabak, the National Institutes of Health’s principal deputy director, to Rep. James Comer (R-Ky.) confirms that the NIH funded research at the WIV during 2018-2019 that manipulated a bat coronavirus called WIV1.

    Researchers at the institute grafted spike proteins from other coronaviruses onto WIV1 to see if the modified virus was capable of binding in a mouse that possessed the ACE2 receptors found in humans — the same receptor to which SARS-CoV-2 binds. The modified virus reproduced more rapidly and made infected humanized mice sicker than the unmodified virus.

    Starting in 2014, the NIH’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, headed by Dr. Anthony Fauci, funded the New York-based research nonprofit EcoHealth Alliance with annual grants through 2020 for “Understanding the Risk of Bat Coronavirus Emergence.”

    …Tabak’s letter asserts that the modified virus becoming more virulent “was an unexpected result” and not “something that the researchers set out to do” — an odd claim, considering that the whole point of manipulating the virus was to investigate things that could make it more virulent.

More: https://legalinsurrection.com/2021/11/letter-offers-more-evidence-of-wuhan-lab-project-source-of-covid-pandemic/

[mountaineer]

NIH director confirms agency hid early COVID genes at request of Chinese scientists
By Steven Nelson   
May 11, 2022 3:47pm

National Institutes of Health acting director Lawrence Tabak confirmed to lawmakers Wednesday that US health officials concealed early genomic sequences of COVID-19 at the request of Chinese scientists — but insisted the data remains on file.

Tabak told a House Appropriations subcommittee that the NIH “eliminated from public view” the data from the pandemic epicenter in Wuhan, China, before adding that researchers can still access it via an archaic “tape drive.”

Vanity Fair recently reported that the information was hidden in response to a request from Chinese scientists, despite potentially resolving whether the virus leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology or passed naturally from animals to humans.

Rep. Jaime Herrera Beutler (R-Wash.) asked Tabek to explain why US officials would comply with such a request. ...

NY Post

[mountaineer]

 NIH Acting Director Lawrence Tabak speaks about the deletion of early COVID sequences at the behest of Chinese scientists. NIH archives data hidden from public view on a tape drive.

https://twitter.com/emilyakopp/status/1524415015507406848

[Smokin Joe]

But I was told this was a "Conspiracy theory" (even though this version leaves out the first chapters of the story)