Since the COVID-19 outbreak began, China and its rivals have been locked in a battle over the origins of the virus, with the US in particular pushing a theory that it…
The long-anticipated report from a World Health Organization (WHO) mission to China’s Wuhan has found that it’s “extremely unlikely” that SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, escaped from a research lab. However, it also failed to firmly point the finger at animal-to-human transmission as well, which until now was the prevailing thesis. The 12-nation team, which included Chinese scientists, also looked at direct zoonotic transmission to humans (possible-to-likely), introduction through an intermediate host followed by spillover (likely to very likely), and introduction through the cold food chain (possible). As Sputnik has previously reported, the lattermost field, which was raised by the Chinese government after it was proven that SARS-CoV-2 can survive in a deep freeze for significant amounts of time, was widely lambasted in the Western media, which instead pushed the lab escape theory, which has never had serious credibility. In fact, the lab escape theory emerged from some media figures even before COVID-19 had reached a global pandemic phase, and by March 17, 2020, scientists had already sequenced the virus’ genome and found it impossible to have been engineered.
