Washington, DC: In a startling revelation, America’s outgoing Director of National Intelligence (DNI) Tulsi Gabbard has accused former chief medical advisor of the country Anthony Fauci of having funded research at China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology.
Fauji was also accused of colluding with ‘politicised’ intelligence officers to suppress this information.
The Wuhan lab is where the COVID-19 virus, which caused a global pandemic in 2019-2020, is believed to have originated.
These claims were made by Gabbard based on documents she declassified and released to the public on her last working day as the DNI.
She accused Fauci of having funded gain-of-function research at the Wuhan lab, suppressing his actions in collusion with ‘politicised elements within the intelligence community,’ and lying to the United States Congress under oath. After the COVID-19 pandemic ravaged global systems, several people peddled an idea that the virus was leaked in the public from a lab in Wuhan, as reported by News18.
Scientists, however, believed it likely originated in the city’s wet markets.
“It’s time you know the truth,” Gabbard posted on X.
Gain of Function is a type of research in which scientists genetically alter an organism to enhance its biological functions.
Pathogenesis is the way in which the disease develops within the host animal. It is crucial for researchers trying to understand how these ailments function and prevent or stop them.
Bats a
re believed to be the primary natural reservoir and evolutionary source of the sars-covid virus that took the lives of over 7.1 million people globally.
As bats are sold for meat at Wuhan’s wet markets, it was believed that the virus spread from one of them.
Gabbard, however, said she is releasing so far unseen communications and documents that expose Fauci’s role in the alleged conspiracy that suggests COVID-19 originated in a lab in China. She said Fauci used US taxpayers’ money for this.
Fauci was the head of the National Institue of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) in the US. In that role, he “provided millions in US taxpayer dollars to fund dangerous gain-of-function research on bat coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV)-work which is now widely viewed as the source of the unintentional lab leak that sparked the pandemic,” a press release on the website of the Office of Director of National Intelligence says.
NIAID “supports basic and applied research to better understand, treat, and ultimately prevent infectious, immunologic, and allergic diseases”, its mission statement says.
“NIAID supports research at external academic and research institutions through funding opportunities including grants, contracts, and cooperative agreements,” its official website states. It also says that the institute is “always accepting researcher-initiated applications”.
This means that researchers and institutions across the world can ask for funding assistance if their research is on infectious diseases.
The press release from Gabbard’s department did not specify what was the exact content of research funded by the NIAID under Fauci’s leadership. Nor did it give details that make clear what was the communication that revealed Fauci tried to suppress his wrongdoing.
“A contractor was terminated just days after coming forward to ODNI as a whistleblower,” it has been mentioned at the end of the release.
“Managers reminded analysts who advocated for the lab-leak hypothesis that leadership would determine which analysts would be promoted,” it further said.