The Wuhan lab leak theory that seeks to determine the true origins of the coronavirus that caused the global COVID pandemic quickly gained steam in the last couple of months due to newly surfaced reports that supported the theory. One name that often comes up when talking about this theory is the World Health Organization's viral expert, Peter Daszak, who is also the president of EcoHealth Alliance, a non-profit that does research on emerging diseases, conservation, and public health.
But why is WHO's Peter Daszak a name that frequently comes up when talking about the Wuhan lab leak theory? The British zoologist's name is often linked to the COVID Wuhan lab leak theory because his organization funnelled about $600,000 in U.S. taxpayer money from the U.S. National Institutes of Health to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which may have been the true origin of COVID, the New York Post reported. In fact, when the Wuhan lab leak theory came about, he was one of the first to condemn such an idea.
Daszak even went as far as writing and publishing a statement in the esteemed British medical journal The Lancet, which was signed by 27 other scientists expressing their "solidarity with all scientists and health professionals in China" and declaring the Wuhan lab leak theory as merely a conspiracy theory that suggested COVID did not have a zoonotic origin, Vanity Fair reported. Daszak even reportedly tipped two scientists who he worked with at China's Wuhan Institute of Virology, advising him to refrain from signing the statement to distance themselves from their involvement with WIV.
But more evidence has surfaced that Daszak is truly knee deep in the development of deadly viruses in collaboration with Chinese scientists. The National Pulse has published a voice recording to Daszak admitting he worked with Chinese scientists to manufacture "killer" viruses." The voice recording was from a video taken during a February 2016 speech recorded by C-SPAN.
"Some of the viruses will be killers, and some of them won't. How do we work that out from a viral sequence? It is not straightforward. First of all, we're only looking at viral families that include those that have gone into people from animals. So we narrow it down straight away. Then when you get a sequence of a virus and it looks like a relative of a known nasty pathogen," Daszak explained in the voice recording.
"So we sequence the spike protein, the protein that attaches to cells then we-well I didn't do this work but my colleagues in China did the work," Daszak said. "You create pseudo-particles, insert proteins from the viruses that can bind to human cells."
Daszak, who led the team that "investigated" COVID origins in China was also found to have thanked infectious diseases expert and White House adviser Dr. Anthony Fauci for dismissing the lab leak theory, WND reported. An email to Dr. Fauci showed that Daszak thanked him for downplaying the Wuhan lab leak theory and suggesting that COVID had zoonotic origins.
Listen to Daszak below:
