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The Office of the Director of National Intelligence report stated that there is no indication the researchers were hospitalised due to COVID, and that the intelligence community couldn’t confirm if any of the researchers had handled live viruses before falling ill.
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‘No direct evidence’ COVID started in Wuhan lab – US intelligence
A four-page report that was declassified on Friday was unable to discover the origins of the pandemic – but did not rule out the possibility the virus came from a lab..
Sky News reporter @niamhielynch Saturday 24 June 2023 03:11, UK
A US intelligence report has found no direct evidence that COVID started in China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology.
In a four-page report that was declassified on Friday, intelligence agencies said it was unable to discover the origins of the pandemic but said it could not rule out the possibility the virus came from a laboratory.
“The Central Intelligence Agency and another agency remain unable to determine the precise origin of the COVID-19 pandemic, as both (natural and lab) hypotheses rely on significant assumptions or face challenges with conflicting reporting,” the report said.
The intelligence agencies did not find evidence of a specific incident at the Wuhan Institute (WIV) that could have caused the outbreak despite “extensive work”.
“We continue to have no indication that the WIV’s pre-pandemic research holdings included SARSCoV-2 or a close progenitor, nor any direct evidence that a specific research-related incident occurred involving WIV personnel before the pandemic that could have caused the COVID pandemic.”
Reports of several Wuhan lab researchers falling ill with respiratory symptoms in late 2019 are also inconclusive, the report argues, saying some of their symptoms weren’t consistent with COVID.
https://news.sky.com/story/no-direct-evidence-covid-started-in-wuhan-lab-us-intelligence-12908708
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The Sydney Morning Herald
COVID origin still a mystery despite release of intelligence report
By Riley Griffin
June 24, 2023 — 11.41am
Washington: US intelligence agencies weren’t able to determine whether researchers at a laboratory in Wuhan, China, who fell sick in the fall of 2019 were infected with COVID-19, which soon spread around the world, according to a declassified report.
The Office of the Director of National Intelligence unveiled details about scientists at Wuhan Institute of Virology who fell ill in 2019 before the first documented COVID infections, as well as coronavirus research conducted at the lab by the Chinese People’s Liberation Army.
However, none of the released intelligence definitively pointed to lab-related work as the cause of the pandemic, which has caused nearly 7 million deaths.
The report comes months after US President Joe Biden signed a bill into law requiring the declassification of intelligence related to the pandemic’s potential links to the lab. It will do little to settle the hotly contested debate over how COVID-19 started, already the source of partisan clashes and probes.
It’s also far from the final word on how the pandemic got its start. Intelligence officials have said they’re still seeking key information from China.
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The ODNI report stated that there is no indication the researchers were hospitalised due to COVID, and that the intelligence community couldn’t confirm if any of the researchers had handled live viruses before falling ill.
The report acknowledged that Wuhan researchers have collaborated with the People’s Liberation Army on public-health research that included coronaviruses, and vaccines and treatments for such viruses, though no known research that could have led to the emergence of SARS-CoV-2.
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