US intelligence has presented President Joe Biden with a new classified report on the origins of the coronavirus. However, experts have not been able to come to an unambiguous conclusion.
About it informs The Washington Post citing US officials. The secret service did not confirm, but also did not deny any of the existing versions – including the theory of the artificial origin of COVID-19 through the fault of China.
The intelligence actions are dictated by the instructions of the president, who at the end of May ordered to find out the origin of the virus within 90 days. “Despite the analysis of a lot of existing intelligence and the search for new evidence, intelligence officers did not come to a consensus“, – the message says.
The authors of the report note the need to force Beijing to share laboratory records, genome samples and other information related to COVID-19. One of the sources of the publication noted that the world community will not be able to understand the causes of the pandemic if China will not provide access to certain datasets.
What versions are there?
Now none of the existing versions has been officially confirmed. However, here are the main ones:
-
The coronavirus could be transmitted to humans directly from a bat. For example, this could happen with a bite. The fact is that these animals are a reservoir for a huge number of infections, including coronaviruses. And scientists have warned for many years that future epidemics will be associated with bats.
-
There could be an intermediate host in the chain of transmission of the virus. One of the possible versions looks like this: bat → pangolin → human.
-
A person could become infected with the coronavirus by eating bat meat. Moreover, bats are used in China for cooking and as a means of traditional medicine. This is the most popular version now.
-
The virus could have appeared artificially. According to one theory, this happened by accident due to insufficient security during the experiments.
–Could China Be Guilty?
Is that possible. Wuhan has an Institute of Virology, the only place in the country to which the highest level of biological safety standards are applied. There, scientists are researching all sorts of viruses in animals, including coronaviruses.
It is known that the staff of this center went on business trips to Yunnan Province. It is in this region that bats live, which can be potential sources.
In addition, the American intelligence services found out that in November 2019, three laboratory workers were admitted to the hospital with symptoms that are similar in description to COVID-19. And the Chinese authorities could hide this – the first cases of coronavirus were officially recorded only in December.
–
