US virus probe an exercise in futility

Since the declassified report released by the US intelligence community on Oct 29 has also failed to reach a conclusion on the origins of the novel coronavirus, the futility of the US President Joe Biden's directive to the intelligence agencies to "investigate" a purely scientific matter has come to the fore. The report also highlights the political motive behind the Biden administration's move: to stigmatize China for the COVID-19 pandemic.

Although the report released by the Office of the Director of National Intelligence said a natural origin and lab leak are both plausible hypotheses for how the novel coronavirus first jumped to humans, it stressed that analysts disagree on whether any definitive conclusion could be reached on the issue.

In particular, it rejected any suggestion that SARS-COV-2 originated as a biological weapon, saying those claiming so had no "direct access to the Wuhan Institute of Virology", and accused such people of spreading disinformation.

The intelligence community report issued on Oct 29 is an update of the 90-day investigation report the Biden administration released in August in the midst of a controversy over the US' efforts to blame China for the pandemic instead of the governments that didn't appropriately respond to the spread of the virus to protect their peoples.

The Biden administration has been following in the footsteps of its predecessor in blaming China for all its ills including the tens of millions of COVID-19 infections and millions of deaths in the US rather than apportioning the blame where it is due－the Donald Trump administration's lax response to the pandemic.

To begin with, Trump sidelined Anthony Fauci, head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who has won international praise as an adviser on HIV/AIDS to six US presidents.

Trump also reduced the role of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention which, unlike in the past, was relatively inactive even at the height of the pandemic in the US. Its relative inactivity even prompted the Union of Concerned Scientists to issue a warning.

Worse, Trump fired some leading career government scientists, and created such a situation that Rick Bright was forced to resign from his post at the National Institutes of Health in October 2020. In April 2020, Trump had Bright removed as the director of the Biomedical Advanced Research and Development Authority, which clears funds for drugs and treatment to help fight disease outbreaks. The reason: Bright had criticized the administration's pandemic response.

Behind all these moves of Trump was his single-point mission to blame China for the pandemic, especially the spread of the virus in the US.

But instead of disavowing Trump's actions and ordering a probe into the COVID-19-like cases at Fort Detrick in Maryland that emerged before the first novel coronavirus case was reported in Wuhan, Biden has continued to follow his predecessor's playbook. Perhaps he didn't order a probe into the Fort Detrick cases because it was the center of the US 'bioweapons' program from 1943 to 1969－and a probe could have resulted in skeletons tumbling out of Washington's closet.

China is committed to exchanging information and cooperating with the rest of the world to help trace the origin of the virus. But any research in this matter should be impartial and conducted by scientists, including leading epidemiologists and virologists. And World Health Organization scientists, with the help of Chinese scientists, have already carried out studies in Wuhan.

Can the US deny that the WHO experts, rather than US intelligence, are best suited to conduct research into a pandemic? Shouldn't the US also probe its own labs?

More important, even if the US intelligence community's report suggested something different from what it has done, there was no reason for the world, including the US leadership, to believe it was right. In fact, the world has stopped believing the US intelligence community after it presented false evidence to claim Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction so former president George W. Bush could invade Iraq even without the UN's sanction. And we all know how much destruction and deaths the US has caused in Iraq and Afghanistan in the name of its "war on terror".

The US is a past master at political manipulation. It has always used such ploys to blame other countries for non-existent causes. Hence, its intelligence community's report should be taken with a pinch of salt. And the US must not forget that the international community does not support unilateral action by any country. There are international norms to follow and the UN Charter to abide by.

In particular, the international medical community and pharmaceutical companies should focus on research and try to build solid barriers against any future pandemic, so people, especially the poor, around the world don't have to pay the price for the mistakes and inaction of their governments.

China appropriately responded to the US intelligence community's report with Liu Pengyu, spokesperson for the Chinese embassy in Washington, saying:"The US moves of relying on its intelligence apparatus instead of scientists to trace the origins of COVID-19 is a complete political farce... It will only undermine science-based origins study and hinder the global effort of finding the source of the virus."

The world needs to fight the pandemic together and help those countries in need, especially those in financial difficulties because of lockdowns, rather than playing political blame games.

The views don't necessarily reflect those of China Daily.

The author is doctoral research fellow, Faculty of Commercial International Law, China University of Political Science and Law.

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