USA: hearing on artificial origin of covid-19
Two years after the advent of Covid-19, a serious institutional debate has now opened in the United States on gain of function laboratory experiments.
On August 3, 2022, a group of scientists and academics discussed the risks and benefits of virus manipulation experiments at the Senate Home Security Department and Government Affairs Committee on Emerging Threats. According to the definition of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the gain of function research deals with genetic modifications and experiments on viruses and pathogens aimed at increasing their potency and transmission.
According to Richard Ebright, professor of chemistry at Rutgers University:
Gain of function research can increase scientific knowledge, but it has no civil practical application.
During the unprecedented hearing strongly desired by Republican Senator Rand Paul, various issues were touched, including the national security issues posed by the research, and the need for control of the projects by independent bodies, not directly involved in the experiment.
Rand Paul said in the opening:
Gain of function research has the potential to trigger global pandemics that threaten the lives of millions of people, yet this is the first time the matter has been discussed in a congressional hearing.
It was Paul who cornered the virologist Anthony Fauci earlier this year, for his alleged responsibility for the origin of Sars-Cov-2. On 11 January 2022, the US Congress had made public a series of e-mails involving, among others, Anthony Fauci and which showed the intent of a specific circle of scientists to brand the artificial origin of the virus as a conspiracy theory. Fauci had denied any involvement, but government documents show that Fauci's ministry was funded in favor of the EcoHealth Alliance. It is a controversial American non-profit organization, active in Wuhan in the search for Coronovirus of bats.
Steven Quay, one of the most authoritative medical and pharmacological researchers in the world and founder of Atossa Therapeutics in Seattle, also spoke at the hearing. The researcher explained the nature of a global gain of function study project, called the Global Virome Project (GVP).
The declared goal of the Global Virome Project? Collect 500,000 unknown viruses capable of infecting humans and take them all to a laboratory near you. What could go wrong.
Quay is author with Paolo Barnard of the book" The origin of the virus. The hidden truths that have killed millions of people ”. The hearing will be the first step in a real investigation, necessary to establish any responsibility for a virus that has upset the entire globe.
References:
https://www.foxnews.com/politics/rand-paul-vows-get-answers-covid-19-origins-gain-function-hearing
https://www.c-span.org/video/?522133-1/hearing-virus-research-funding&live
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