What many of us suspected all along - in the face of various US officials lying through their teeth about their role in the Wuhan lab’s research - has now finally surfaced:
“Dr. Tabak,” asked Rep. Debbie Lesko (R-Ariz.) of the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, “did NIH fund gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology through [Manhattan-based nonprofit] EcoHealth [Alliance]?”
“It depends on your definition of gain-of-function research,” Tabak answered. “If you’re speaking about the generic term, yes, we did.”
I would welcome a source that makes the same claim that isn’t the NYPost. I note that your science.org link isn’t making the same claim.
NYPost may be correct, but I spent a hot minute trying to find ANY other site (other than the Republicans on their committee website) that is supporting such a bombshell claim.
Correction: I just found the same claim on Fox too, so there is that. "gain of function and “nih director dr tabak” produced no other results making this claim.
Edit: I did find this from October 2021. Perhaps the NYPost is conflating.
EcoHealth’s research has come under increased scrutiny after more details about its work in China have been revealed, either through congressional or journalistic pressure. The NIH letter, flawed though it may be, indicates the federal government is taking a closer look, too.
But we see no reason to change the Two Pinocchio rating we awarded Paul. There is a split in the scientific community about what constitutes gain-of-function research. To this day, NIH says this research did not meet the criteria — a stance that is not an outlier in the scientific community. Indeed, it appears as if EcoHealth halted the experiment as soon as it seemed to veer in that direction.
I do not think either of you understood the answer. That does not mean the funding was specific to COVID or the pandemic.
It just meant overgrown children in Congress can pull your chain.
Until you get past allowing people in Congress to pull your chain so easily we have problems at a nation. Just following idiotic stuff with blather is the fall of our nation, our world.
We have a climate crisis.
We have proxy wars.
We have a rearming of the major powers.
We have an industrial policy being threatened by dumb and dumber.
We have renewable energy imperatives being threatened by dumb and dumber.
Chasing every utterance in Congress that pulls your chain makes you uninformed.
Pulling people’s chains is not going to make science dot org or Nature. That does not mean the chains were not pulled.
I had exactly the same question, and pretty much the same results. Found Fox, found WaPo, found Congress, didn’t find any other news source with similar information.
If I had the time, I’d try to find the transcript of the testimony and see what else was in there. I’d like to see if these articles skipped over other parts of the testimony that explained things further.
Check the 58:00 mark of the linked video. The provided quote isn’t complete and provides zero context. It does depend on the definition of GOF research. If you’re speaking about the regulatory term, no they didn’t.
PS - The Oversight and Accountability Committee is not a serious committee.