(Ken Silva, Headline USA) President Donald Trump on Monday signed an executive order to stop “dangerous gain-of-function research,” which some scientists believe may have caused the COVID-19 pandemic.
Among other things, the order says it will end federal funding of this research by foreign entities in places such as China or other countries where there’s not adequate oversight to ensure they comply with U.S. policies and standards.
Moments before signing the order, Trump said the virus that causes COVID-19 “leaked out in my opinion,” from a lab in China, a theory the president has wholly embraced since coming back into the White House.
Under the Trump administration, the covid.gov website now shows a photo of himwalking between the words “lab” and “leak” under a White House heading. It mentions that Wuhan, China, where the coronavirus first began spreading, is home to a research lab with a history of conducting virus research with “inadequate biosafety levels.”
The web page also accuses Dr. Anthony Fauci, the former director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, of pushing a “preferred narrative” that COVID-19 originated in nature.
The origins of COVID have been disputed for years, but the FBI and some other intelligence officials have surmised since early 2020 that it likely came from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. U.S. labs and scientists were likely involved in the Wuhan research, too.
As has been widely documented, the FBI concluded with “moderate confidence”in 2020 that COVID likely originated from a lab leak. Three scientists at the National Center for Medical Intelligence, part of the Pentagon’s Defense Intelligence Agency, also reportedly concluded that “Covid-19 was manipulated in a laboratory in a risky research effort.”
Multiple COVID-era health officials have flip-flopped on the lab-leak theory in recent years.
Former National Institutes of Health director Dr. Francis Collins, for instance, reportedly admitted in January 2024 that the COVID-19 lab-leak hypothesis is plausible—a drastic reversal for a scientist who was involved in attempts to suppress information that COVID may have leaked from a lab.
Dr. Collins further admitted that the “6 feet apart” social distancing recommendation promoted by federal health officials was likely not based on any science or data.
Dr. Collins’s interview with the Coronavirus Subcommittee follows a 14-hour interview of former NIH head Anthony Fauci, who also admitted to the lab-leak theory’s plausibility.
The Associated Press contributed to this report.
Ken Silva is the editor of Headline USA. Follow him at x.com/jd_cashless.
