The possibility of a leak from a virus lab in Wuhan being responsible for the coronavirus pandemic was a mainstream theory on the virus’s origins when it was first advanced. The media was quoting their sources in U.S. intelligence that were looking into that angle. But after the tainted WHO origins team finished their “investigation” and announced that not only was there no sign the disease leaked from a Wuhan lab but that the team would no longer continue to investigate the lab-leak theory, the media began a campaign to silence those who wanted to write or talk about it.
Then, this past week, two stories appeared that changed the momentum of reporting on the lab-leak theory. A group of 18 prominent scientists said it was too early to dismiss the lab-leak theory and that the WHO investigation had been tainted by Chinese government interference. The scientists called for another independent investigation.
This past weekend, the Wall Street Journal reported that U.S. intelligence believes that several workers at the Wuhan lab became ill in the fall of 2019, leading to hospitalizations.
Suddenly, it’s all the rage in the mainstream media to talk about the possibility of a lab -eak that caused the pandemic. Even Dr. Anthony Fauci has succumbed and now says he’s “not sure” the coronavirus occurred naturally.
But many prominent scientists have been calling for another investigation — including the lab-leak hypothesis — since the WHO team got back from China in March. And U.S. intelligence agencies have claimed all along that the lab-leak theory could not be dismissed.
They will never admit it, but the media and the left turned a reasonable hypothesis into a conspiracy theory almost overnight. In truth, there were some on the right advancing hysterical theories of a “bio-weapon,” but few serious writers ever posited the notion that the coronavirus was a deliberate attack.
But turning the theory into a “conspiracy theory” and all the baggage that term brings to the discussion was done because it was a useful political club to discredit Donald Trump and his supporters. Admittedly, the lab-leak theory is based on a lot of circumstantial evidence. But so is the animal-to-human theory of transmission. The key to understanding the media’s hysterical pushback against the lab-leak theory is in the burning desire to see Donald Trump — and his supporters — dismissed as kooks and crazies.
