Lab origins hypothesis has its day in the sun

A new assessment by the Department of Energy pushes the envelope slightly more towards a lab accident in Wuhan. The biggest consequence will be a lifting of the three year "conspiracy theory" stigma.

Wuhan/ AndrewHorne at English Wikipedia

Some days the battle over Covid origins, especially on social media, is reminiscent of the fights between the Sharks and the Jets from “West Side Story.” In this modern day incarnation, the fight is between the “Lab Leakers” and the “Zoonati” (also known as the “Zoo Crew”), partisans of a zoonotic transfer or natural origin of SARS-CoV-2.

The fierce debate has raged for three years now, starting from the first days of the pandemic. In a recent piece in Truthdig, I traced how discussion around the virus became so politicized, and I did not spare either side from criticism—even though I personally think the tactics of the zoonosis side have sometimes been particularly atrocious.

The past 24 hours have seen a wave of social media triumphalism among Lab Leakers, due to a Wall Street Journal report that the U.S. Department of Energy has changed its evaluation on Covid origins from undecided to a likely lab origin—albeit it with “low confidence.” (The intel agencies are badly split between lab accident, natural origins, and undecided; the strongest vote for a lab origin comes from the FBI, with “moderate confidence.”)

The news was quickly picked up by media outlets around the world, including other legacy media in the U.S. such as the New York Times, and CNN featured a long segment on the news.

As more sober observers realize, the DoE evaluation does not mean the debate over Covid origins has ended, even though the department’s new estimation is reportedly based on some kind of new information not yet revealed. If anything, a serious debate is just now beginning, with Republicans in Congress launching at least two new investigations and key players (Fauci and others) likely to face subpoenas or at least invitations to testify.

But it does mean that the public can, and most definitely should, stop listening to those scientists and journalists who for three years have branded the lab origins hypothesis a “conspiracy theory.” It most certainly is not; rather, as I and many others have argued for a long time, it is a perfectly plausible explanation for how this killer pandemic began. (For more details, please see posts of “Words for the Wise” over the past several months.)

A key reason the hypothesis is plausible is the relentless refusal of the Chinese government to disclose what kinds of research were being done in the Wuhan Institute of Virology and other labs in the city. We know for a fact that they were working on genetic engineering of SARS-like viruses, in collaboration with and supported by the New York-based organization EcoHealth Alliance (president, Peter Daszak.) And we know that in the wake of a U.S. moratorium on so-called gain-of-function research from 2014 to 2017, Chinese scientists, who had benefitted from technology transfers from U.S. labs, developed and improved their own genetic engineering systems and animal models, especially transgenic mice with human viral receptors.

So there never was anything crazy or conspiratorial about the lab origins hypothesis, even if—in my opinion, although many diehard Lab Leakers would not agree—the evidence for both leading scenarios for Covid origins is inconclusive and completely circumstantial.

And it should not be surprising that the intel agencies differ in their evaluations. Each has its own specializations, and its own sources and methods. The DoE, for example, runs a large number of labs, some of which are involved in biodefense work and some of which have been directly involved in Covid research from the early days of the pandemic. Those activities may well give the DoE access to certain specialized information, including from contacts in China.

The FBI, on the other hand, is supposed to be expert in forensic biology, and the CIA may have (although it’s never sure with the CIA) human sources within China.

It’s been interesting to watch the reactions of the Zoo Crew over the past day. Many of its leading spokespersons have reacted with a kind of panicky desperation, emphasizing the “low confidence” of the DoE evaluation but forgetting to mention the “moderate confidence” of the FBI. Some members of that camp have actually continued to use the term “conspiracy theory” even as the foundations of that claim are crumbling.

But some are already hedging their bets just a bit. A sensitive barometer might be the reaction of Angela Rasmussen, a virologist now based in Canada who has been one of the most vociferous defenders of the natural origins faith, often using toxic trolling and demeaning insults against anyone who tries to defend a lab leak (other Zoo Crew members have shamefully failed to call out Rasmussen’s tactics, which are as anti-science as any anti-vaxxer can muster, or have engaged in online abuses nearly as bad.)

Rasmussen’s reaction is a sign that zoonosis proponents might have already begun to hedge their bets, especially if we find out more about what new information made the DoE change its mind. After all, the intel agencies under the Biden administration cannot easily be branded as MAGA trolls or conspiracists. And a growing number of scientists have been getting over their shyness about expressing their own views, which often include the reasonable observation—consistent with the official position of the World Health Organization—that all cards are still on the table when it comes to Covid origins.

(One can even imagine Rasmussen and other Zoonatis on “Meet the Press” a year from now, explaining the science behind a Wuhan lab leak and doing mea culpas about how they got it wrong.)

Speaking as a journalist, I can guarantee you that my colleagues at the Times and many other news outlets will be pursuing the origins question with a new vigor now that the stigma on the lab origin hypothesis is rapidly lifting. There could even be Pulitzers in store for some reporters and publications, even if over the past three years independent journalists and “alternative” publications and investigators have been doing almost all the heavy lifting on the story (via whistleblower leaks, FOIA requests, etc.)

In the meantime, Congressional investigators are sure to insist that the intel agencies share, at least behind closed doors, what they know and what information they have; and, of course, there will be leaks.

But the intel agencies and the Biden administration should not wait for that. All of their information on Covid origins should now be declassified, with appropriate redactions to protect sources and methods. With a million Americans dead, and possibly up to 14 million dead around the world, we need to know—we have the right to know—how this historic human disaster got its start.