U.S. Senator Ron Johnson (R-WI), the ranking member of the Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations, has brought to light documents from 2017, highlighting serious safety concerns at the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV).
The revelations came as part of a letter sent to Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Xavier Becerra and National Institutes of Health (NIH) Acting Director Lawrence Tabak.
In the letter, Johnson emphasized his continued requests for an interview and records from Dr. Ping Chen, an official from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), who reportedly raised alarms about safety inadequacies at the WIV in October 2017.
The documents revealed by Senator Johnson detailed Dr. Chen’s communications regarding the lack of appropriate training at the WIV, quoting, “It is clear to me by talking to the technician that certainly there is a need for training support.”
Dr. Chen’s warnings ostensibly informed a January 2018 State Department cable about the WIV which noted that during interactions “with scientists at the WIV laboratory, they noted that the new lab has a serious shortage of appropriately trained technicians and investigators needed to safely operate this high-containment laboratory.”
Senator Johnson’s revelations come after a series of efforts since 2021 to unveil how NIAID and NIH officials responded post-receipt of Dr. Chen’s report, yet the actions, if any, remain obscured due to what Johnson characterizes as HHS’s unwillingness to be transparent.
The senator accuses HHS of “stonewalling and obstructing” legitimate oversight, compelling his staff to review documents “in camera” at HHS headquarters rather than receiving unredacted records transparently.
Interestingly, during these in-camera document reviews, staff members were able to transcribe the contents of previously redacted records.
The senator alleges that this information was deliberately withheld by HHS from the public via Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests and from Congress.
The senator noted the significant differences in the images of Dr. Chen’s report, stating, “The image on the left shows what HHS produced publicly via FOIA. On the right is an image of what my staff transcribed during an in-camera review of Dr. Chen’s report.”
Senator Johnson is particularly critical of the redactions made by HHS in the FOIA documents, implying that they were an attempt to conceal the report’s contents from the public.
He stated, “In the public FOIA document, HHS redacted Dr. Chen’s entire report claiming that it contains privacy and deliberative information. Following my staff’s in-camera review of the report, it seems apparent that the only reason that HHS redacted this information was to hide the report’s contents from the American people.”
The senator further emphasized that perhaps the motive behind these redactions was to prevent the public from understanding that NIH and NIAID officials were informed of the safety concerns at the WIV as early as 2017.
Senator Johnson has given HHS and NIH until October 5, 2023, to furnish unredacted records related to Dr. Chen and the WIV and to make Dr. Chen available for an interview.
The motive is clear: to ascertain the extent to which NIH and NIAID officials addressed the concerns raised and to expose any concealment of information critical to public health and safety.
Read Sen. Johnson’s letter here:
