Wuhan lab leak now the ‘most likely’ cause of Covid pandemic and the truth WILL come out, experts tell MPs
A LAB leak from Wuhan is now the “more likely” cause of the Covid pandemic, experts have told British MPs.
Dr Alina Chan, a genetic engineering expert, said she was “very confident” the truth will eventually come out about the origins of the deadly bug.
The molecular biologist at MIT and Harvard believes a lab leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) is “more likely than not” after two unsuccessful years of searching for an animal host.
The WIV – a high security facility specalising in coronaviruses – has been in the eye of the storm as questions rage over whether Covid could have escaped from its lab.
Both China and the lab have furiously denied any allegations, but evidence of a lab leak has been piling up over the last year as scientists, researchers and governments hunt for answers.
Dr Chan told the Science and Technology Select Committee: “I think the lab origin is more likely than a natural origin at this point.
“We all agree there was a critical event at the wet market that was a superspreader event – caused by humans. But there is no evidence pointing to a natural animal origin of the virus at that market.”
And Dr Chan said she was “very confident” the truth about Covid will eventually emerge in years to come – when it’s safe for whistleblowers to step forward.
“We’ve seen from previous cover-ups that it just takes time, because right now it’s not safe for people who know about the origin of the pandemic to come forward,” she said.
“It might be five years from now, it might be 50 years from now, but we live in an era where there is so much data being collected and stored that it will eventually come out.”