Former FDA Chief Says ‘Lab Leaks Happen All the Time’ Amid Probe Into COVID Origins

Last week, US President Joe Biden ordered the intelligence community to redouble efforts to investigate the origins of the coronavirus and to report their findings to him within 90 days.

Accidental lab leaks happen “all the time,” former Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Scott Gottlieb said.

“It’s important to understand what the possibility is that this came out of a lab so we can focus more international attention on trying to get better inventories around these labs, what they’re doing, better security, make sure they’re properly built,” Gottlieb told CBS’ “Face the Nation” on Sunday amid reports that an accident occurred at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

According to Gottlieb, China is able to provide “exculpatory” evidence proving that COVID did not leak from a lab, but has so far refused to do so. 

He also said that lab security is generally weak in countries around the world: “These kinds of lab leaks happen all the time, actually,” he said.

“Even here in the United States, we’ve had mishaps, and in China, the last six known outbreaks of SARS-1 have been out of labs, including the last known outbreak, which was a pretty extensive outbreak that China initially wouldn’t disclose that it came out of a lab.”

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