[House Hearing, 118 Congress]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office]
INVESTIGATING THE ORIGINS OF COVID-19
=======================================================================
HEARING
BEFORE THE
SELECT SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE CORONAVIRUS
PANDEMIC
OF THE
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND ACCOUNTABILITY
HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES
ONE HUNDRED EIGHTEENTH CONGRESS
FIRST SESSION
__________
MARCH 8, 2023
__________
Serial No. 118-4
__________
Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Accountability
[GRAPHIC NOT AVAILABITY IN TIFF FORMAT]
Available on: govinfo.gov,
oversight.house.gov or
docs.house.gov
COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND ACCOUNTABILITY
JAMES COMER, Kentucky, Chairman
Jim Jordan, Ohio Jamie Raskin, Maryland, Ranking
Mike Turner, Ohio Minority Member
Paul Gosar, Arizona Eleanor Holmes Norton, District of
Virginia Foxx, North Carolina Columbia
Glenn Grothman, Wisconsin Stephen F. Lynch, Massachusetts
Gary Palmer, Alabama Gerald E. Connolly, Virginia
Clay Higgins, Louisiana Raja Krishnamoorthi, Illinois
Pete Sessions, Texas Ro Khanna, California
Andy Biggs, Arizona Kweisi Mfume, Maryland
Nancy Mace, South Carolina Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, New York
Jake LaTurner, Kansas Katie Porter, California
Pat Fallon, Texas Cori Bush, Missouri
Byron Donalds, Florida Shontel Brown, Ohio
Kelly Armstrong, North Dakota Jimmy Gomez, California
Scott Perry, Pennsylvania Melanie Stansbury, New Mexico
William Timmons, South Carolina Robert Garcia, California
Tim Burchett, Tennessee Maxwell Frost, Florida
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia Becca Balint, Vermont
Lisa McClain, Michigan Summer Lee, Pennsylvania
Lauren Boebert, Colorado Greg Casar, Texas
Russell Fry, South Carolina Jasmine Crockett, Texas
Anna Paulina Luna, Florida Dan Goldman, New York
Chuck Edwards, North Carolina Jared Moskowitz, Florida
Nick Langworthy, New York
Eric Burlison, Missouri
Mark Marin, Staff Director
Mitchell Benzine, Subcommittee Staff Director
Marie Policastro, Clerk
Contact Number: 202-225-5074
Miles Lichtman, Minority Staff Director
Select Subcommittee On The Coronavirus Pandemic
Brad Wenstrup, Ohio, Chairman
Nicole Malliotakis, New York Raul Ruiz, California, Ranking
Mariannette Miller-Meeks, Iowa Minority Member
Debbie Lesko, Arizona Debbie Dingell, Michigan
Michael Cloud, Texas Kweisi Mfume, Maryland
John Joyce, Pennsylvania Deborah Ross, North Carolina
Marjorie Taylor Greene, Georgia Robert Garcia, California
Ronny Jackson, Texas Ami Bera, California
Rich Mccormick, Georgia Jill Tokuda, Hawaii
C O N T E N T S
----------
Page
Hearing held on March 8, 2023.................................... 1
Witnesses
Dr. Jamie Metzl, Ph.D., Senior Fellow, The Atlantic Council
Oral Statement................................................... 6
Nicholas Wade, Former Science and Health Editor, The New York
Times; Former Editor, Science; and Former Editor, Nature
Oral Statement................................................... 8
Paul G. Auwaerter, MD, MBA, Clinical Director, Division of
Infectious Diseases; Sherrilyn and Ken Fisher Professor of
Medicine; Johns Hopkins School of Medicine; Past President,
Infectious Diseases
Oral Statement................................................... 10
Dr. Robert Redfield, M.D., Former Director, U.S. Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention
Oral Statement................................................... 12
Opening statements and the prepared statements for the witnesses
are available in the U.S. House of Representatives Repository
at: docs.house.gov.
Index of Documents
----------
David Duke Statement and article, ``Jews, Race, and Nicholas
Wade: How Jewish Supremacism Attempts to Guard the Gates of
Science''; submitted by Rep. Mfume.
Article, The New York Times, ``Charging Into the Minefield of
Genes and Racial Difference''; submitted by Rep. Mfume.
Article, Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC), ``Troublesome
Sources: Nicholas Wade's Embrace of Scientific Racism'';
submitted by Rep. Mfume.
Letter to the Editor, The New York Times, ``Letters: A
Troublesome Inheritance''; submitted by Rep. Tokuda.
Testimony of Professor Jeffrey Sachs, Chair of the Lancet COVID-
19 Commission; submitted by Chairman Wenstrup.
The documents listed above are available at: docs.house.gov.
INVESTIGATING THE ORIGINS OF COVID-19
----------
Wednesday, March 8, 2023
House of Representatives
Committee on Oversight and Accountability
Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic
Washington, D.C.
The subcommittee met, pursuant to notice, at 9:03 a.m., in
room 2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Brad R. Wenstrup
(chairman of the subcommittee) presiding.
Present: Representatives Wenstrup, Malliotakis, Miller-
Meeks, Lesko, Cloud, Joyce, Greene of Georgia, Jackson of
Texas, McCormick, Ruiz, Dingell, Mfume, Ross, Robert Garcia,
Bera, and Tokuda.
Dr. Wenstrup. Good morning, everyone. The Select
Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic will come to order. I
want to welcome everyone who's here today, as well as our
witnesses. Without objection, the Chair may declare a recess at
any time. Pursuant to rule 7(d) of the Committee on Oversight
and Accountability, and at the discretion of Chairman Comer,
Mr. Jordan, a member of the full committee, may participate in
today's hearing for the purposes of questions. I now recognize
myself for the purpose of making an opening statement.
Welcome to our first of many hearings concerning the
coronavirus pandemic. We are tasked to review all the effects
of the pandemic, as well as decisions made during the pandemic,
not just the origins of COVID-19. However, we are here today at
our first hearing to ask the fundamental question that this
body has failed to ask three years ago: Where did COVID-19 come
from? Did it come from a natural spillover, transferred from a
bat to an intermediate source to human? In other words, did it
come from nature? Or was it the result of a laboratory or
research-related accident? In other words, did it come from a
lab?
This question is fundamental to helping us predict and
prevent future pandemics, protecting our health and national
security, and preparing the United States for the future. This
question is not one that should be dismissed out of hand. It
cannot be taken lightly. It must be investigated thoroughly,
responsibly, and honestly, an investigation based on facts,
expert opinions, and without intentional or unintentional bias.
That is what the Select Subcommittee is tasked to do;
follow the facts, conduct a fair investigation, and seek to
deliver the truth to the American people. Ultimately, we will
strive to produce a product that will serve future generations,
enhancing our capabilities and operating procedures when we are
faced with the threat of another pandemic. That is what is
deserved. That is what Americans should expect from their
government, and this is one more way we can provide for our
defense.
The work has already begun. Thus far, the Select
Subcommittee has sent letters of inquiry to the Department of
Health and Human Services, the White House, and Dr. Francis
Collins of the National Institute of Health, the Office of the
Director of National Intelligence, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the
former Director of National Institutes of Allergy and
Infectious Diseases and Chief Medical Advisor to the President;
EcoHealth Alliance, recipient of NIH funding grants to perform
coronavirus research, the Department of Energy, Department of
State, and the FBI, concerning their intelligence and
investigations surrounding the evolution of COVID-19 and any
forensic findings they may have discovered.
Over the weekend, we released a memo highlighting new
evidence that suggests that Dr. Fauci prompted the drafting of
a publication that would disprove the lab leak theory, that the
author skewed evidence to achieve that goal, and that the
current chief scientist of the World Health Organization was an
uncredited coauthor even though he appears to have contributed
to the piece entitled, ``Proximal Origins.''
I think we've already established that the Select
Subcommittee will try to leave no stone unturned to try to find
the truth. Unfortunately, the question of the origins has been
politicized. That's no secret. It has driven most people to
their corners rather than driving apolitical scientific debate
or discussion. Some say the virus came from nature that,
according to recent papers discussed in New York Times, the
science is dispositive.
Some say it's too unique, too primed for human
transmission, that there's too much circumstantial evidence
that points to COVID-19 coming from a lab. As well, in three
years, there's been no track found to prove that COVID-19
evolved naturally from an animal or a mammal or a tick to
become highly infectious to humans. The truth is we don't know
the origins of COVID-19 yet for sure. We don't have a smoking
gun.
First, the science behind COVID-19: the genome of COVID-19
is inconsistent with expectations, and is unique for its group
of viruses. COVID-19 has both a binding domain optimized for
human cells, and a furin cleavage site, or a small part of the
virus that makes it so infectious. That has never been seen
before in a SARS-related virus. In other words, COVID-19 has
unique characteristics that made it very infectious to humans.
These have never been seen before in any other viruses of its
type.
Most viral outbreaks are slow and small. CDC data shows
SARS infected approximately 8,000 people worldwide, and eight
in the U.S. Similar with MERS, which infected approximately
2,000 people worldwide. But COVID-19 was primed for human
transmission. It has infected more than 750 million people
worldwide. Dr. Redfield, one of our witnesses here today and a
virologist, has even said that he believes COVID-19 had a
detour from nature to be educated how to infect humans.
Second, the known research occurring in China: We know the
Wuhan Institute of Virology was conducting gain-of-function
research on novel bat coronaviruses by creating chimeric
viruses, combining two viruses together to test infectivity and
infecting mice with these viruses, work that former COVID-19
task force coordinator, Dr. Deborah Birx confirmed was, in
fact, gain-of-function, contrary to statements by Dr. Fauci. We
have learned that the Wuhan Institute has poor biosafety and
was conducting this research at only Biosafety Level 2,
described as the ``Wild West'' by Dr. Jeremy Farrar, a
virologist from the U.K., now Chief Scientist for the WHO.
We have learned through a leaked DARPA grant application
that with U.S. taxpayer backing, the Wuhan Institute proposed
inserting furin cleavage sites into novel coronaviruses, the
same unique genetic aspect of COVID-19. And we know, according
to a State Department fact sheet, the multiple researchers at
the Wuhan Institute were sick with COVID-19-like symptoms in
the fall of 2019, before the Chinese officially announced the
outbreak.
Third, concerning the actions of NIH and EcoHealth
Alliance, records show that the National Institutes of Health
while the U.S. was under a moratorium on gain-of-function
research, exempted EcoHealth Alliance and the Wuhan Institute
from this very ban. Records show that the National Institutes
of Health allowed EcoHealth to conduct risky research on novel
coronaviruses at the Wuhan Institute without going through the
potential pandemic pathogen department level review board.
Records show that EcoHealth violated Federal grant policy, and
failed to file its five-year progress report for more than two
years.
Records show that EcoHealth violated the terms of its grant
and failed to report an experiment that resulted in gain-of-
function of a coronavirus at the Wuhan Institute.
Fourth, for some reason that we do not yet know, leaders in
the scientific community took action to attempt to convince the
world that they should not take the lab leak theory seriously.
Dr. Francis Collins stated he was more concerned with harm to
``international harmony'' than he was with investigating the
lab leak. Dr. Fauci said the lab leak theory was a ``shiny
object that will go away in time.''
The president of EcoHealth, Dr. Peter Daszak orchestrated a
letter in The Lancet that called the lab leak a ``conspiracy
theory,'' a statement that directly benefited Dr. Daszak
himself. And four scientists, after a conference call with Dr.
Fauci, completely reversed their position. Dr. Kristian
Andersen said he found ``the genome inconsistent with
evolutionary theory.'' And Dr. Robert Garry said he ``really
can't think of a possible natural scenario.'' But a few days
later, published a paper saying the exact opposite, a paper
based on the new emails we released claim to be prompted by Dr.
Fauci himself.
Fifth, the intelligence: FBI Director, Christopher Wray,
confirmed publicly that the FBI assessed COVID-19 most likely
originated from a lab incident in Wuhan. The Wall Street
Journal reported the Department of Energy now also believes a
lab leak is the most likely origin. These aren't run-of-the-
mill agencies. The FBI used experts in biological threats and
is reportedly supported by the National Bioforensic Analysis
Center and the Department of Energy used its own Z Division,
experts in investigating biological threats. These are some of
the facts as we know them, but there's so much more to do. We
are here today to try and understand what and why.
It's important to conduct this investigation. Discovering
the origins is vital. It matters for the future of the world,
and we aren't finished. We're just beginning. There will be
more hearings and more inquiries and more documents discovered,
and we will follow every lead. I look forward to hearing from
our expert witnesses today, and I thank them for joining us
today. Thank you.
I would now like to recognize Ranking Member Ruiz for the
purpose of making an opening statement.
Dr. Ruiz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Today, the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic
convenes for its first hearing to discuss the origins of the
COVID-19 pandemic, an issue of vital importance to our Nation's
public health. Since the first outbreak of COVID-19,
researchers in the scientific community have worked tirelessly
to evaluate the virus and advance our understanding of its
origins. Dozens of studies have been conducted, or are
currently underway, to evaluate this question. And under
President Biden's direction and leadership, the intelligence
community initiated a sweeping assessment to get to the bottom
of the virus' origins.
The facts are the evidence remains inconclusive. Therefore,
we must allow our scientists and intelligence communities to
gather evidence without politicization, extreme partisan
rhetoric, or conspiratorial accusations that vilify our
Nation's public health experts.
Instead, we should focus on developing policies that
prevent and reduce the harm of future viruses and pandemics. As
Ranking Member of this select subcommittee, it is my sincere
hope that we can conduct this work in an objective, bipartisan
way, based on evidence to save lives.
However, today's hearing marks a concerning step down the
path of letting extremism get in the way of an inquiry that
should be led by science and facts. When House Republicans
announced this hearing with their slate of handpicked
witnesses, I was alarmed to see someone who wrote a book
applauded by white supremacists. Mr. Nicholas Wade's 2014 book,
``A Troublesome Inheritance,'' suggests that different racial
and ethnic groups have evolved to possess genetic variations
and traits and behaviors tied to whether they prosper or not.
For example, Mr. Wade speculates that certain populations
have evolved to develop greater innate intelligence. He writes
that quote, ``Intelligence can be more highly rewarded in
modern societies because it is in far greater demand,'' end
quote, and conversely, he claims that certain populations have
been slower to experience an evolutionary change he has
described as quote, ``the transformation of a population's
social traits from the violent, short-term, impulsive behavior
typical of many hunter, gatherer, and Tribal societies into,
quote, `the more disciplined future oriented behavior observed
in other populations.'"
The notion that people of different racial or ethnic groups
are more successful or intellectually superior to another
because of predisposed genetic makeup is grossly inconsistent
with the consensus of scientific and medical scholarship. That
is why I sent a letter to my Republican colleagues this morning
strongly urging them to disinvite Mr. Wade as a witness so as
not to give legitimacy to a man of such discredited,
unscientific, and harmful views.
These views are dangerous and have no place in a hearing
examining the origins of a pandemic that has disproportionally
and overwhelmingly harmed communities of color in the United
States. I'm concerned that Mr. Wade and his views have been
elevated by his participation on today's panel, giving him a
platform reaching millions of Americans. His participation
hurts the credibility of this hearing. Answering the question
of how the novel coronavirus came to be one that should be
driven by the need for thoughtful policy solutions. Whether the
novel coronavirus emerged naturally or as a result of a lab
leak does not change this.
And as our expert communities work to advance our
understanding of the virus' origins, Congress should be focused
on developing commonsense solutions to put people over politics
and protect our Nation from the threat of a future public
health crisis.
There is still time for this select subcommittee to change
course, to reject extreme partisan rhetoric, discard
conspiratorial accusations and work constructively to save
lives. The American people deserve nothing less.
I yield back.
Dr. Wenstrup. I thank the Ranking Member.
I would like to remind the Ranking Member, and all those
here, that the Ranking Member was informed of our witnesses
seven days ago yet objected this morning. Now, I understand
that they had some problems getting their witness because of
COVID, but we just received who their witness was today. Also,
I'd like to point out that Mr. Wade is here as he was the
editor of Nature Magazine and Science Magazine. Nature Magazine
is the magazine--not while he was there, but is the magazine
that produced and printed ``Proximal Origins.''
We will proceed, and I expect that our witnesses will
proceed in sticking to the topic at hand today as opposed to
trying to deviate from it.
Mr. Wade. Mr. Chairman, may I respond?
Dr. Wenstrup. You'll have a chance. You'll have your
opening statement.
Our witnesses today are Dr. Jamie Metzl. Dr. Metzl served
on the National Security Council under President Bill Clinton,
the State Department under Secretary Madeline Albright, and as
Deputy Staff Director for Senator Joe Biden on the Senate
Foreign Relations Committee. He's currently a senior fellow at
the Atlantic Council. Mr. Nicholas Wade. Mr. Wade has worked in
field of health and science journalism for more than 40 years.
He worked for Nature Magazine, Science Magazine, and was then
the science editor for The New York Times. He is now a
freelance journalist and author writing extensively about
COVID-19.
Dr. Paul Auwaerter--did I say that correctly, sir?
Dr. Auwaerter. You did.
Dr. Wenstrup. Dr. Auwaerter was the President of the
Infectious Diseases Society of America, the largest
professional society worldwide related to infectious diseases.
He is currently a Professor of Medicine at Johns Hopkins
University School of Medicine, serving as the Clinical Director
for the Division of Infectious Diseases.
Dr. Robert Redfield. Dr. Redfield spent more than 45 years
in medicine and is a virologist by training. He served as Chief
of the Department of Retroviral Research at the Walter Reed
Army Institute of Research, co-founded the Institute of Human
Virology at the University of Maryland, and was the Director of
the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention from 2018
to 2021, serving during the pandemic itself.
Pursuant to Committee on Oversight and Accountability rule
9(g), the witnesses will please stand and raise their right
hands.
Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the testimony that you
are about to give is the truth, the whole truth, and nothing
but the truth, so help you God?
Thank you. Please be seated. Let the record show that the
witnesses all answered in the affirmative.
The Select Subcommittee certainly appreciates you all for
being here today, and we do look forward to your testimonies.
Let me remind the witnesses that we have read your written
statements, and they will appear in full in the hearing record.
Please limit your oral statements to five minutes.
As a reminder, please press the button on the microphone in
front of you so that is on and Members can hear you. When you
begin to speak, the light in front of you will turn green.
After four minutes, the light will turn yellow. When the red
light comes on, your five minutes has expired, and we would ask
that you please wrap up.
I now recognize Dr. Metzl to give an opening statement.
STATEMENT OF DR. JAMIE METZL, PH.D.
SENIOR FELLOW, THE ATLANTIC COUNCIL
Mr. Metzl. Chairman Wenstrup, Ranking Member Ruiz, and
members of the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic,
it is my great honor to join you today. We are primarily here
because the Chinese government has done everything in its power
to prevent the type of investigation into the origins of the
COVID-19 pandemic that is three years overdue and still
urgently required. We are also here because there is more that
we in the United States can and must do to push forward, even
if China continues to stonewall. This includes establishing a
bipartisan U.S. national COVID-19 commission.
I have waited more than three years for these hearings to
be held. Getting to this point has required a great deal of
effort by a small but tireless, self-motivated, and highly
capable community of experts from around the world who have
refused to be bullied into silence. Because so many of us have
worked so hard for so many years against such ferociously
strong headwinds to help lay the groundwork for these hearings,
I join you today with a deep and sincere request that your
committee honor our work by making these hearings as evidence-
based, probing, and solutions-oriented as possible.
Understanding what went wrong and determining how we can do
better must be the ultimate bipartisan and nonpartisan issue. I
happen to be a Democrat, which is irrelevant to our work
together. Since the start of the pandemic, I have been in close
contact with officials in the Trump and then the Biden
administrations and have worked with Members of Congress of
both parties on the pandemic origins issue. Although my views
are laid out more fully in my written testimony, I'd like to
quickly highlight my key points.
First, and most importantly, approximately 20 million
people, including over 1 million Americans, have died as a
result of COVID-19. These are our parents, partners, children,
relatives, colleagues, and friends. We owe every one of these
victims and ourselves the fullest possible investigation into
how this avoidable tragedy unfolded and our best efforts
ensuring that a catastrophe like this never happens again.
Second, while the question of pandemic origins remains
open, there can be no doubt that a research-related origin
remains a very serious possibility, if not a distinct
probability. There is no smoking gun proving a laboratory
origin hypothesis, but the growing body of circumstantial
evidence suggests a gun that is at very least warm to the
touch. Those feeling otherwise also deserve to have their
perspectives and research carefully considered. We should all
be open to evolving our views as new evidence emerges. Everyone
working in good faith to follow the evidence wherever it leads
is on the same side. Those working to prevent this type of
investigation are not.
Third, it is inconceivable that over three years after this
deadly pandemic began, no comprehensive and unfettered
investigation into pandemic origins has been carried out, nor
is one currently planned. This injustice is an insult to every
victim of this crisis, and a clear threat to future
generations. The primary reason there has been no comprehensive
investigation into COVID-19 origins is the reprehensible
actions of the Chinese government.
Since the early days of the pandemic, China's government
has destroyed samples, hidden records, imprisoned brave Chinese
journalists, gagged Chinese scientists, actively spread
misinformation, and done pretty much everything possible to
prevent the kind of unfettered, evidence-based investigation
that is so urgently required. Every person on Earth must demand
accountability from China. Calling for a full investigation of
pandemic origins in China does not at all mean we shouldn't
carefully examine our own behavior and that of our friends and
allies. In fact, we must.
Fourth, although scientific collaboration, including with
Chinese scientists remains critical to building a safer future,
we cannot purchase these relationships by our silence. We must
at least match the courage of brave Chinese citizens, like
Zhang Zhan who is rotting away in a Chinese prison for asking
the same questions many foreigners seem somehow afraid to ask.
There is no possible way to establish the principle of
transparency and accountability tomorrow without fearlessly and
unequivocally establishing that principle today.
Fifth, even if China continues to stonewall, there are
critical steps we can and must take in the United States and
elsewhere to move this process forward. This includes
establishing a bipartisan U.S. national COVID-19 commission to
examine the origins issue, as well as other failings and
shortcomings on the national and international levels and
develop bold recommendations for next steps.
Sixth, because the pandemic has taught us, at least I hope,
that in our increasingly interconnected world, we are all only
as safe as the most vulnerable among us, making us more secure
here in America requires we do everything possible to help
build a safer world, including by helping upgrade the World
Health Organization. Although some people have criticized the
WHO for how it has dealt with the origins issue, it is my view
as outlined in my written testimony that WHO Chief Doctor
Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has been, in many ways, an unsung
hero of this process.
Chairman Wenstrup, Ranking Member Ruiz, and members of the
subcommittee, our world is entering a new era of globalization,
where risks are increasing across the board, including the risk
of pandemics far deadlier than COVID-19. If we do not get to
the bottom of what went wrong with the COVID-19 pandemic, if we
fail in our efforts to fearlessly understand all shortcomings
and shore up the vulnerabilities this crisis has so clearly
exposed, the victims of the next pandemic, our children and
grandchildren, will ask us why we failed to protect them when
we knew what was at stake and had the chance.
Thank you.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you. I now recognize Mr. Wade to give
an opening statement.
STATEMENT OF NICHOLAS WADE
FORMER SCIENCE AND HEALTH EDITOR
THE NEW YORK TIMES
Mr. Wade. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Although it's a gigantic distraction from the work of your
committee, I think I should briefly try to respond to the
attempt by Ranking Member Ruiz to discredit my testimony by
saying a number of untrue things about the book I wrote 10
years ago on the biology of race. This was a determinately non-
racist book. It has no scientific errors that I am aware of. It
has no racist statements, and it stresses the theme of unity
that we are all variations on the same human genome. My book
was vigorously attacked by obscure academics who want everyone
else to believe that there is no biological basis to race. And
my book was as welcomed to them as pictures of the earth from
space are to flat-earthers.
I have nothing to be ashamed of in my book. It's the only
place you can now read about what the genome says about human
races, and I hope Mr. Ruiz, if he reads it, will be pleasantly
surprised to find it says none of the things he says it said.
With apologies for that digression, Mr. Chairman, I would
like to thank you for inviting me to discuss the origin of the
COVID virus and hope you will allow me a few extra minutes. I
am a science writer, and I worked on two leading research
journals, Nature and Science, and then for 30 years on The New
York Times, where I was an editorial writer and a science
editor. This background has given me some knowledge of how the
scientific community works.
I'd like to touch on two issues of interest to the
committee: Where did the SARS-2 virus come from, and why are we
taking the lab-leak idea seriously only now, instead of three
years ago? When the epidemic first broke out in December 2019,
natural origin and lab leak were two equally reasonable
explanations. But if the virus had emerged naturally, it should
have left many telltale signs in the environment. None has yet
appeared, despite the Chinese government's keen interest in
finding them.
As each month passes without such evidence, the natural
origins idea has grown steadily weaker, it seems to me. For lab
leak on the other hand, the evidence has been building. Here
are two of the three strongest pieces of evidence in favor of
lab leak. First, the epidemic broke out not in some random
Chinese city, but right in Wuhan, home of the Wuhan Institute
of Virology. We know that scientists there were genetically
engineering coronaviruses under seriously inadequate safety
conditions, and we know that viruses escape from labs all the
time. Clearly, lab leak has to be a strong possibility.
Second, that possibility became much more concrete with the
recent surfacing of a grand proposal by the Wuhan researchers
and others. They applied, in 2018, for a $14 million grant from
a Pentagon program called Project DEFUSE. The essential
ingredient of SARS-2, as the Chairman has said, one which makes
the virus so infected is a small genetic element called a furin
cleavage site. Wuhan researchers said in their grant proposal
that they would insert this very element into a group of
coronaviruses. And not only that, they will place the element
at a very specific point on the virus' genome called the S1/S2
junction.
Now, the DOD turned the proposal down. It was too risky
even for them, but the researchers may have done much of the
basic work already or could have find other ways to finance it.
A year later, the SARS-2 virus appears on the scene, and guess
what? It possesses a furin cleavage site, the only known member
of its large family of viruses to do so. And the cleavage site
is positioned right at the S1/S2 junction. Why should evolution
produce, at that very time and at that very place, a virus of
the exact type described in the DEFUSE proposal? It's surely
much easier to believe that the Wuhan researchers did exactly
what they proposed and generated the SARS-2 virus in their lab.
But if the evidence for lab leak is so strong, why do so
many people still believe the virus came from nature? The
reason is that the natural origin camp got its story out first,
always a big help. It very successfully painted lab leak as a
conspiracy theory before anyone in the public proposed it. The
national media swallowed the natural origin story unskeptically
and once committed to it, failed to report important contrary
evidence such as the DEFUSE Grant. Science journalists in
particular, it seems to me, fell down on their job by failing
to check out the virologists' self-serving claims.
The natural origin theory did not prevail by accident. It
was promoted by science administrators in the United States and
England, including Francis Collins and Anthony Fauci of the
National Institutes of Health. The NIH is a national treasure
and Collins and Fauci's most prominent leaders at the time are
well-known to the public and on Capitol Hill. It's hard to
believe that in the twilight of their long careers, they would
seriously mishandle an issue as important as the origin of the
COVID virus. Yet, that is what the evidence seems point to.
The campaign to discredit lab leak began on the evening of
January 31, 2020, when Fauci received an email from four
virologists led by Kristian Andersen of Scripps Research; they
had all concluded that SARS-2, because of its furin cleavage
site, could not been made in nature. Fauci was probably not too
pleased to hear that the virus might have escaped from research
that his agency had funded.
A strange thing happened to the virologists' conclusion.
Within four days, Andersen, in an email of February 4,
repudiated, deriding lab leak as a crackpot theory. What made
him change his mind? No new scientific evidence about the virus
came to light between January 31 and February 4, but from that
180-degree reversal, a whole campaign was able to be developed,
including highly influential articles placed in Nature Medicine
and the Lancet.
I have some ideas about how this and other research should
regulated, which I described in my written testimony. I'll stop
there.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you.
I now recognize Dr. Auwaerter to give an opening statement.
STATEMENT OF DR. PAUL G. AUWAERTER, MD, MBA
(MINORITY WITNESS), CLINICAL DIRECTOR
DIVISION OF INFECTIOUS DISEASES
SHERRILYN AND KEN FISHER PROFESSOR OF MEDICINE
JOHNS HOPKINS SCHOOL OF MEDICINE, PAST PRESIDENT
INFECTIOUS DISEASES SOCIETY OF AMERICA
Dr. Auwaerter. Chairman Wenstrup, Ranking Member Ruiz, and
distinguished members of the subcommittee, thank you for the
opportunity to testify. Though I'm from the Johns Hopkins
University School of Medicine, I speak on behalf of the
Infectious Diseases Society of America, and my statements do
not represent Johns Hopkins.
Over 1 million Americans have died from COVID losses that
magnify the tremendous suffering among countless families in
our country. As a physician caring for patients with COVID for
over three years, we need to deepen our understanding of the
virus' origins and apply experience from the pandemic to
improve our preparedness, prevent disease, and save lives.
Investigations must be objective and driven by appropriate,
scientific, and intelligence experts who present unbiased
findings. Investigations are ongoing. There's no consensus yet
about the virus' origins. The Department of Energy, with low
confidence, determined the virus escaped from a laboratory in
China based on classified information unavailable to the
public. The FBI reached its conclusion with moderate
confidence.
On the other hand, many virologists believe compelling
evidence points to an animal origin. They conclude that
coronavirus most likely jumped from a caged wild animal into
people at a seafood market. We may never know the origin
conclusively. Making claims that cannot be supported
sufficiently by available data only fuels confusion and
mistrust. Regardless, we can learn valuable lessons from these
investigations to prevent outbreaks and pandemics of any
origin.
A robust public health infrastructure and global
coordination are essential for surveillance to identify, track,
and contain potential threats. Pathogens respect no borders. We
must collaborate internationally to foster an unsuspicious
atmosphere where global information, sharing about infectious
diseases is transparent, complete, and rapid.
Twenty years ago, the SARS outbreak provides an instructive
example of what can be achieved through multi-countries,
scientific, and public health collaboration. Within six months,
these collective efforts were successful in staunching the
virus, and it has not reappeared. Greater transparency about
science, decisionmaking, and public health will help improve
health literacy and rebuild trust in science and public health,
including understanding why recommendations evolve as knowledge
grows.
If people are better prepared to understand science, they
will be more comfortable deciding how to protect themselves and
their loved ones best. The U.S. should invest in an expert work
force to leverage preparedness tools to benefit all
communities, meaning recruiting and training. Significant
shortages of public health professionals, laboratory
scientists, researchers, and infectious disease physicians
persist. Federal investments are urgently needed to fill these
gaps. Basic translational and clinical research are crucial for
our pandemic preparedness.
For example, rapidly deploying tests for a new pathogen
will enable quicker scaling of testing capacity when new
threats emerge. Investments should also focus on developing
therapeutics for anticipated pathogens, including viruses and
bacteria, including multidrug resistant ones. Sufficient
infectious diseases research capacity improvements to biosafety
are essential. Access to BSL-4 facilities assists in bio-
security research. Therefore, a new BSL-4 lab should be
strategically placed throughout our Nation.
The Federal Government should support biosafety studies,
including why laboratory accidents happen, their frequency, and
other data needed to create and update evidence-based
mitigation measures. Enhanced potential pandemic pathogens,
ePPP research, a type of gain-of-function research has received
renewed attention. Such efforts can help understand possible
human pathogen interactions, assess the likelihood of emerging
pandemics, and inform preparedness efforts, including
surveillance and medical countermeasure developments.
While such research is inherently risky requiring strict
oversight, there are risks if we don't undertake this type of
research, leaving us unprepared. Unbiased bodies with
appropriate scientific expertise should perform this oversight.
Last year, the U.S. Government charged the National Science
Advisory Board for Biosecurity (NSABB) with reviewing policies
regarding ePPP research and dual-use research of concern
(DURC). In January, the NSABB released recommendations to
strengthen the oversight of ePPP and DURC research in the U.S.
and abroad, remove blanket exclusions, expand research types
considered ePPP, strengthen guidelines, and increase
transparency in the research review process.
These guidances can facilitate achievements with improved,
appropriate guardrails. I am grateful for your attention and
for inviting me. The Infectious Diseases of Society also thanks
you for your leadership and stands ready to partner with you to
learn from the pandemic and to improve our readiness.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you.
I now recognize Dr. Redfield to give an opening statement.
STATEMENT OF DR. ROBERT REDFIELD, M.D.
FORMER DIRECTOR
U.S. CENTERS FOR DISEASE CONTROL AND PREVENTION
Dr. Redfield. Chairman Wenstrup, Ranking Member Ruiz, and
members of the committee, I'm pleased to testify today in
support of this subcommittee's important work to investigate
the origin of COVID-19 that has resulted in the deaths of over
1 million Americans. From 2018 to 2021, I served as the 18th
Director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
during the Trump Administration. As CDC Director, I oversaw the
Agency's response to the COVID-19 pandemic from the earliest
days of its spread, and I also served as a member of the White
House Coronavirus Task Force.
But perhaps more relevant for the purpose of this hearing,
my 45 years in medicine have been focused on the study of
viruses. I'm a virologist by training and by practice. Prior to
my time at CDC, I spent more than 20 years as a U.S. Army
physician and medical researcher at the Walter Reed Army
Institute of Research where I served as the Chief of the
Department of Retroviral Research, and I worked in virology,
immunology, clinical research, at the forefront of AIDS
epidemic, and other threats.
In 1996, I cofounded the Institute of Human Virology at the
University of Maryland in partnership with the state of
Maryland, the city of Baltimore, and the University System of
Maryland, where I served as the director of clinical research
and care. And I also served as a tenured professor of medicine,
microbiology, and immunology, chief of infectious disease and
vice chair of medicine at the University. After my time at CDC,
I served as the senior public health advisor to Governor Hogan
in the state of Maryland.
As COVID-19 began to spread across the world, there were
two competing hypotheses about the origin of this virus that
needed to be vigorously explored. The first hypothesis is the
possibility that COVID-19 infections in humans were the result
of a spillover event from nature. This is a situation in which
the virus naturally mutates and becomes more transmissible from
one species to another, in this case from bats to humans via an
intermediate species. This is what happened in previous
outbreaks of SARS and MERS and earlier coronaviruses that
emerged from bats and spread through an intermediate animal.
The second hypothesis is the possibility that the virus
evolved in a laboratory involved in gain-of-function research.
This is a type of research in which scientists seek to increase
the transmissability or pathogenicity of an organism in order
to better understand that organism and inform preparedness
efforts and the development of countermeasures such as
therapeutics and vaccines.
Under this theory, COVID infected the general population
after it was accidentally leaked from a lab in China. From the
earliest days of the pandemic, my view of both theories about
the origin needed to be aggressively and thoroughly examined.
Based on my initial analysis of the data, I came to believe,
and I still believe today, that it indicates that COVID-19 more
likely was the result of an accidental lab leak than a result
of the natural spillover event.
This conclusion is based primarily on the biology of the
virus itself, including the rapid high infectivity for human-
to-human transmission, which would then predict the rapid
evolution of new variants as well as a number other important
factors, which also include the unusual actions in and around
Wuhan in the fall of 2019, all of which I'm happy to discuss
today.
Even given the information that surfaced in the three years
since the COVID-19 pandemic began, some have contended that
there's really no point in investigating the origin of this
virus. I strongly disagree. There is a global need to know what
we are dealing with in COVID virus because its effects how we
approach the problem to try to prevent the next pandemic. The
understanding of the origin of COVID is critical to future
science research, particularly as it affects ongoing ethical
debate around gain-of-function research.
Gain-of-function research has long been controversial
within the scientific community, and in my own opinion, COVID-
19 pandemic presents a case study on the potential dangers of
such research. While many believe that gain-of-function
research is critical to get ahead of viruses by developing
vaccines, in this case, I believe it was the exact opposite;
unleashing a new virus to the world without any means of
stopping it and resulted in the deaths of millions of people.
Because of this, it's my opinion that we should call for a
moratorium on gain-of-function research until we have a broader
debate, and we come to a consensus as a community about the
value of gain-of-function research. This debate should not be
limited to the scientific community. If the decision is to
continue with gain-of-function research, then it must be
determined how and where to conduct that research in a safe and
responsible and effective way.
I thank you for inviting me here today as we explore this
important topic. I look forward to answering your questions.
Thank you.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you. I thank you all.
I now recognize myself for questions. I have said since we
started this that the goal of this committee would be to come
away with some capabilities or at least standard operating
procedures in an effort to be able to predict the next
pandemic, prepare for the next pandemic, protect ourselves from
the next pandemic, and hopefully prevent the next pandemic.
But first, I want to ask each of the witnesses, yes or no:
Does the origin of COVID-19 matter to protect the globe from
future pandemics? We'll go down the line. Dr. Metzl?
Mr. Metzl. One-hundred percent, absolutely and completely
yes.
Dr. Wenstrup. Mr. Wade?
Mr. Wade. Yes.
Dr. Wenstrup. Dr. Auwaerter?
Dr. Auwaerter. Yes.
Dr. Wenstrup. Dr. Redfield?
Dr. Redfield. Yes.
Dr. Wenstrup. So, we're all on the same page there.
Dr. Metzl, I have a question for you. You know we've heard
the testimony, and we know, scientifically fact, that we have
found in the past with these types of viruses, coronaviruses in
particular, SARS, MERS, we found an intermediary.
My question is: Do you feel that we, as a scientific
community around the world, have robust capabilities to do that
type of investigation to find an intermediary? Do we have the
assets we need for that?
Mr. Metzl. Technically, we do, and we know that the Chinese
government has actually been very aggressive in trying to find
that kind of intermediary host animal. They've sequenced about
100,000 animals. They haven't found anything in SARS and MERS
as you mentioned. Those intermediary hosts were found
relatively quickly. And so, given that the Chinese government
has every incentive to find an intermediate host, I think it's
very significant that that hasn't been found, but we have that
capability, and everybody has a reason to want to find it,
particularly the Chinese government. I think it's very telling
that after three years, we still haven't found it.
Dr. Wenstrup. Dr. Auwaerter, I ask you the same question
about those capabilities.
Dr. Auwaerter. I would agree that we have the technical
capabilities. What I would say, though, is with coronaviruses,
they are highly mutable, which have--certainly we've seen over
these past three years as the virus has evolved. Regarding
finding intermediaries, there are examples, with the Ebola
virus, where we have not yet found a clear intermediary despite
looking very hard. No one thinks that came about from a lab
accident decades ago.
So, I think it's still an open question. I think everything
does need to be explored, and there's always opposing points of
view here that need to be weighed, and not all hypotheses are
weighed equally.
Dr. Wenstrup. I think it's interesting you talked about
them being highly mutable. I assume they can be mutable in a
lab.
Dr. Redfield, are you an advocate for a moratorium on gain-
of-function research, particularly research on potential
pandemic pathogens, and why?
Dr. Redfield. Yes, I am. I think that, again, the people
that are advocates for gain-of-function research do believe
that by doing this research, they somehow get ahead of the
curve. I'm of the point of view that we don't need to make
pathogens more transmissible or more pathogenic in order to get
ahead of the curve. We can begin to deal with those pathogens
as they evolve. I don't think this should be a decision made by
scientists alone. This is a societal decision. There should be
a broad debate about whether this research is really necessary.
And if so, we should decide how to do it safely and
responsibly.
I remind people that when I was CDC director, one of the
most difficult things I had to do as a 20-something year Army
vet was shut down Fort Detrick. It wasn't very popular. These
people were my friends. I knew them. Our inspections showed
that they were cutting corners in their biosecurity
requirements and I felt that we weren't going to take that
chance with the Frederick community and beyond. So, I shut the
lab down for four to six months until they corrected their
biosecurity.
I think this is much more complicated than people think and
if we are to go down that path, I would argue there are a few
labs in the world that should be, with multiple redundancy, in
containment to do this. But I'm not convinced it's to an
advantage and this is why in The Wall Street Journal op-ed I
did, I strongly recommended that we have a moratorium on gain-
of-function research, similar to what we had in the Obama
Administration.
Dr. Wenstrup. In one sentence, can you provide a definition
of gain-of-function research? I say that because there becomes
a little semantics sometimes I believe within the scientific
community of what is a chimera and what is gain-of-function?
Dr. Redfield. Yes. I think it's to take a pathogen, and try
to increase one of two things or both, to increase its
transmissability or its pathogenicity. I disagree with some of
my colleagues at NIH to say the definition's restricted to a
pathogen that's already a pathogen. If I make a nonpathogen
pathogenic, that's gain-of-function.
Dr. Wenstrup. So, in your expert opinion, was the Wuhan
Institute conducting gain-of-function research on the
coronavirus?
Dr. Redfield. Absolutely.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you. So, one other path of questioning
for you, Dr. Redfield. Proponents of this research claim it may
result in vaccines or maybe even stop a pandemic. Dr. Redfield,
has gain-of-function created any lifesaving vaccines or
therapeutics to your knowledge?
Dr. Redfield. Not to my knowledge.
Dr. Wenstrup. Has gain-of-function stopped a pandemic in
your opinion?
Dr. Redfield. No. On the contrary, I think it probably
caused the great pandemic our world has seen.
Dr. Wenstrup. Do you find any tangible benefits to gain-of-
function research at this time?
Dr. Redfield. I personally don't. But I do want to stress,
I think the men and women that support it are people of good
faith, because they truly believe it's going to lead to a
potential benefit. I disagree with that assessment.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you.
I now recognize the Ranking Member, Dr. Ruiz, from
California for his questions.
Dr. Ruiz. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
The Select Subcommittee's first hearing should provide an
opportunity for our Members to carry out credible, responsible
oversight to prevent and prepare for future pandemics. Instead,
House Republicans invited a writer whose extreme and dangerous
views have been echoed by white supremacists to testify on the
issue of the novel coronavirus' origins.
In May 2014, David Duke, former grand wizard of the Ku Klux
Klan, hosted a radio show praising Mr. Wade and his book, ``A
Troublesome Inheritance.''
Mr. Wade, are you aware of David Duke's praise of your
views on his website?
Mr. Wade. When my book first came out, Mr. Ruiz, I think
the extreme right wing thought it would help their cause, but
they very soon dropped referring to it because when they
actually read it, as many people who talk about my book have
not, they found that the book----
Dr. Ruiz. David Duke did read your book. In fact, he had a
whole radio talk show about it and described it in detail. And
he did endorse your views. On a post, davidduke.com promoting
his radio show, he states, quote, ``Hear Dr. David Duke speak
on the former science editor for The New York Times who has now
essentially embraced the scientific racial truth that Dr. Duke
wrote extensively about in My Awakening, and has written about
for more than 35 years.''
You see, Mr. Wade's book deploys dangerous tropes and
stereotypes about minority communities under the guise of
science. His assertions define the overwhelming consensus of
scientists and researchers, including those in the fields of
population genetics and evolutionary biology.
Dr. Redfield, as a former CDC director, do these views
trouble you?
Dr. Redfield. I'm sorry. I was distracted. I'm sorry. I was
distracted.
Dr. Ruiz. Would the views that I mentioned and David Duke's
endorsements of Mr. Wade's book trouble you?
Dr. Redfield. I'm not a fan of David Duke at all. I do
think that Nicholas Wade--and I have followed his work over 30
years--is an outstanding science reporter, and has contributed
substantially, both in Nature, Science and, of course, leading
The New York Times.
Dr. Ruiz. You know, there are 140 faculty members and
experts who strongly disagree with you. In fact, more than 140
faculty members and experts jointly condemned Mr. Wade's book
in a joint letter to The New York Times Book Review stating,
quote, ``We reject Wade's implication that our findings
substantiate his guess work. They do not. We are in full
agreement that there is no support from the field of population
genetics for Wade's conjectures.''
Mr. Chairman, I'd like to enter this letter into the
record.
Dr. Redfield. My only comment----
Dr. Ruiz. So, I'm sorry, Dr. Redfield.
So, the point is inviting someone with discredited and
dangerous views like Mr. Wade to testify on the origins of this
pandemic, which has disproportionately harmed communities of
color, is not responsible and credible oversight. Instead, it
undermines the credibility of this select subcommittee.
Now, let me turn to you, Dr. Auwaerter.
You are a practicing physician, a professor of medicine,
and the former president of the Infectious Disease Society of
America, representing more than 12,000 physicians, scientists,
and public health experts who specialize in infectious diseases
like COVID-19. For the sake of putting people over politics,
what credible steps can be taken to advance our understanding
of the novel coronavirus' origins in order to prevent future
pandemics?
Dr. Auwaerter. I think building trust amongst scientists
and public health communities is essential, because pathogens
can emerge from where we least expect it. We need to have the
tools available to rapidly analyze and then develop tests. I
had dealt with patients very early in the pandemic where we
were making educated guesses whether they had COVID-19. We need
to have tests that can be widely dispersed quickly and
treatments.
Dr. Ruiz. Dr. Auwaerter, is it possible that we will never
have the concrete evidence to determine with certainty the
origins of COVID, whether it was a lab leak or animal
transmission?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I think that's entirely possible. And
therefore, we need to focus more on also be forward-looking as
well as looking back.
Dr. Ruiz. So, having said that, and being forward-looking,
would it be responsible to start coming up with solutions to
deal with whether it was a lab leak or animal transmission? For
example, is there an international body that promotes safety
guidelines and has the authority to have inspections and
incentivizes foreign nation labs to have transparency so that
we can be assured that labs are safe in foreign country,
especially in not-so-friendly foreign countries?
Dr. Auwaerter. Yes. And I think as already been hinted,
that, I think, is essential for general protection.
Dr. Ruiz. In my research, I couldn't find one. Do you know
of any such body that exists?
Dr. Auwaerter. No, but I'm saying that's absolutely
necessary.
Dr. Ruiz. And what can we do, if it was an animal
transmission, looking forward, to save lives? What can we do to
better our ability to prevent that--I know it's difficult--
identify it early, and contain it in other countries before it
spreads? What can we do?
Dr. Auwaerter. You know, there were efforts a few years ago
to build surveillance labs under prior administrations in an
effort to anticipate and work with other countries.
Dr. Ruiz. And what happened to those labs?
Dr. Auwaerter. I believe they were dropped or discontinued
due to lack of funding.
Dr. Ruiz. OK. Thank you, and I yield back.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you. And I thank the Ranking Member for
transitioning to questions germane to the hearing today.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Dr. McCormick from Georgia
for five minutes of questions.
Dr. McCormick. Dr. Auwaerter, you said in your testimony
that investigations into the origins of COVID-19 should be
objective and driven by appropriate scientific and intelligence
experts who present unbiased findings that are not politicized.
According to evidence and previously released emails on
February 8, 2020, Dr. Andersen who authored ``Proximal
Origins'' stated, ``Our main work over the last couple of weeks
has been focused on trying to disprove any type of lab
theory.''
Would you consider this statement objective and unbiased?
Dr. Auwaerter. I really don't have enough of a frame of
reference to really make a comment on a single statement.
Dr. McCormick. All right. Let's switch then. You cited a
couple papers last summer in Science that talked about the
evidence of natural origin. These papers claim to show
dispositive evidence against lab leak.
Now, I went to medical school. I'm an ER doc. I served lots
of patients during this pandemic until just recently and I know
how viruses work. They are specific to species for the most
part, correct?
Dr. Auwaerter. They often are, but not always. There are
some that are--coronaviruses are probably one of the most
widely dispersed amongst the animal kingdom.
Dr. McCormick. OK. And if we use the origins of a species
that was in the wild and came to human contact and gave us the
virus in question, wouldn't that virus still exist in that
species in the wild?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I think that it would be likely the
case.
Dr. McCormick. Right. Chances are--that's a good answer.
Thank you.
Dr. Auwaerter. Right.
Dr. McCormick. So, how many species is in the wild have we
captured that still have this coronavirus in them? Because that
would be a very easy thing to do given its wide dissemination
in human population and its proximity to Chinese wildlife. How
many wild animals have been captured with this coronavirus
present in them currently?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, the answer is no. But on the other
hand----
Dr. McCormick. Thank you. That's OK. I appreciate it. So,
basically, I'm talking about from a scientific standpoint, we
understand as a virologist and as a student of virology, a good
professor taught me just like yourself, who just said that the
evidence is that diseases just don't go away in populations
that are contained in the wild. And yet, we've extensively
tried to capture--the Chinese government would benefit greatly
from showing us that this exists in the wild and came to human
population. Yet, not one evidence of a certain species, whether
it be dog or bat, has ever been shown to have this virus, that
somehow or another transferred to human.
Yet, that is our main evidence and theory to disprove that,
albeit, the Wuhan lab that actually stated what they were going
to do and then had the same problem occur, that's a less likely
chance in your mind. Is that correct?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I think the hypotheses remain very
open at the moment.
Dr. McCormick. So, which one do you think is more
scientifically based, based on what we just discussed?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I'm not privy to intelligence
community information.
Dr. McCormick. So, you don't have an opinion?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I think it is more likely at the
moment just based on my reading of a zoonotic, that is an
animal based----
Dr. McCormick. So, based on the fact----
Dr. Auwaerter. But we need to attend to both.
Dr. McCormick. So, you intend to favor the hypothesis even
though it has no proof whatsoever that it actually exists in
the animal genome, that you're going to favor that over the
fact that a Wuhan lab that said they wanted to do this and then
had an outbreak about the same time, that that's less likely.
Got it.
First of all, when you talk about having trust, that's the
most important thing you just stated in answer to Mr. Ruiz's
statement. The most important thing is trust.
How do we build trust when there's no transparency from the
CCP when it comes to investigating the origins of this disease?
How do we build trust based on your statement?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I think amongst scientific
communities, that is probably not as high a barrier, but you
know, for the politics, I'd have to leave to others.
Dr. McCormick. But you just stated that's the most
important thing.
Dr. Auwaerter. Correct.
Dr. McCormick. But yet, we don't have transparency on
something that would be pretty easy to investigate if we had
transparency, correct?
Dr. Auwaerter. Again, I would leave to others foreign
policy corridor.
Dr. McCormick. But scientifically, right? We need to have
transparency to investigate something, correct?
Dr. Auwaerter. Absolutely.
Dr. McCormick. OK. And we don't, right?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I think this has been brought up and--
--
Dr. McCormick. Yes. OK. So, we agree on that. That we have
no transparency on the one thing that we need trust on to
investigate the less likely cause of this disease. So, it's
just totally coincidental.
So, with that, I will state that he pretty much agrees with
me when it comes to the origins, just doesn't want to admit it.
Thank you very much. I yield.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize the ranking member of the
full committee, Mr. Raskin from Maryland for five minutes of
questions.
Mr. Raskin. Thank you, Chairman Wenstrup and Mr. Ruiz, for
this important hearing.
The COVID-19 pandemic came to America in 2020, of course,
when Donald Trump was President. And that President's policy
failures, magical thinking, and total recklessness caused,
according to his own special advisor on COVID, Deborah Birx,
the unnecessary deaths of hundreds of thousands of Americans.
Now, apart from the urgent question of how to improve our
pandemic response from the debacle that he presided over is the
question how the COVID-19 pandemic began. This, too, is a
critically important question to answer to help us prevent and
prepare for future pandemics. Answers must come from objective,
fact-based investigations, informed by doctors, scientists, and
public health experts. At President Biden's direction, the
intelligence community is also taking sweeping action now to
understand the origins of the virus and to bring all relevant
facts to light.
Whatever the origins of COVID-19, whether it is bats or
bureaucrats, no finding will ever exonerate or rehabilitate
Donald Trump for his lethal recklessness in mismanaging the
crisis in America which cost us more than a million lives.
Indeed, if COVID was actually the product of a lab leak or the
worst bioweapon of mass destruction ever invented as some have
argued--and obviously we don't have the scientific evidence to
say any of this yet--it would not only not remove Donald
Trump's culpability, it would only deepen his culpability in
the most profound way.
Now, why do I say that? Because over the course of the
crisis beginning in January 2020 and lasting through the spring
on more than 42 different occasions that we have identified so
far, President Trump openly praised and defended the
performance of Communist Party Secretary and Chinese President
Xi in his handling of COVID-19 and boasted of how closely they
were working together and boasted of Xi's openness and
transparency.
On January 22, 2020, when the first case of COVID was
identified in the U.S., Trump stated, I quote, ``We have it
totally under control.'' When asked if he believe the U.S.
would, ``know everything we need to know from China,'' he said,
and I quote, ``I do. I do. I have a great relationship with
President Xi.'' January 24, he posted on Twitter, ``China has
been working very hard to contain the coronavirus. The United
States greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It
will all work out well. In particular, on behalf of the
American people, I want to thank President Xi.'' March 21, in a
briefing, he assured us, ``China has been working very hard to
contain the coronavirus.'' He added, ``The United States
greatly appreciates their efforts and transparency. It will all
work out well.''
March 27, he posted on Twitter, ``just finished a very good
conversation with President Xi of China, discussed in great
detail the coronavirus that is ravaging large parts of the
planet. China has been through much and has developed a strong
understanding of the virus. We are working closely together,
much respect.''
Because of time, I'm just giving the committee a tiny taste
of Donald Trump's fawning, star-struck, sycophantic embrace of
everything the Chinese government was telling him in 2020, but
I will happily offer a lot more for any colleagues who think
that the hunt for the origins will somehow absolve the last
administration for telling Americans that COVID would magically
disappear at Easter time, or everybody should just take
hydroxychloroquine, or refusing to wear a mask, or never
developing a national plan to defeat the disease.
Whether it was bats or leaks or bureaucrats who caused it,
Donald Trump was the biggest apologist in the United States of
America for President Xi and the Chinese Communist Party. He
could have directed the intelligence community to lead a COVID-
19 origin investigation back in March 2020. Three years ago. He
did not. He wasted precious time minimizing the risk of the
virus and lavishing his praise on President Xi. He could have
taken the origins of the pandemic seriously and held the CCP
accountable. He could have pushed back against the CCP for
interfering with the WHO's investigation into its origins, and
he could have asked our intelligence community to intervene. He
did none of those things, and everyone should remember that.
Let's take the politics out of it, and let's get to the bottom
of what happened.
Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I yield back.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Ms. Malliotakis from New York
for five minutes of questions.
Ms. Malliotakis. Thank you, Chairman.
For two years, myself and the other Republicans on this
subcommittee connected the dots, we exposed the evidence
supporting our strong belief that COVID was developed and
leaked from the Wuhan lab. And during those same two years, the
same Democrats that sit on this committee, they only hindered,
they obstructed. They refused to hold hearings and get to the
truth. Now, we see mounting evidence supporting that COVID-19
originated from the lab in Wuhan, China, run by the Communist
Chinese Party. And this hearing is about getting to the truth.
I thank the Chairman for making this the very first hearing,
because the American people who have seen just as many fellow
Americans die from COVID, as nearly as many died from COVID,
that died in every war since the American Revolution combined
deserve to know the truth.
Dr. Redfield, you pointed to the lab leak theory, even
before we did. In mid-January 2020, you expressed concerns to
Dr. Fauci, to Jeremy Farrar of U.K.'s Wellcome Trust, and to
Dr. Tedros of World Health Organization that, quote, ``We had
to take the lab leak hypothesis with extreme seriousness.'' And
you urged Dr. Fauci to investigate both the lab and the natural
hypotheses.
Shortly thereafter on February 1, Farrar convened a meeting
of a group of 11 top scientists across five time zones, and
asked Dr. Fauci to join. And he wrote, ``My preference is to
keep this group really tight. Obviously, ask everyone to treat
in total confidence.''
Dr. Redfield, you were excluded from this call, but up
until then, you were included in every other conversation. What
changed? Why do you think that you were excluded from these
conversations?
Dr. Redfield. Thank you very much. I think--just to
emphasize--in early to mid-January, I did have multiple calls
with Fauci, Farrar, and Tedros about how important I thought it
was that science get engaged and aggressive pursuing both
hypotheses. I also expressed, as a clinical virologist, that I
felt it was not scientifically plausible that this virus went
from a bat to humans and became one of the most infectious
viruses that we have in humans.
All viruses are not the same. When you look at
coronaviruses, for SARS and MERS, for example, when they
entered the human species, which they did via an intermediate,
they never learned how to go from human to human. Even to this
day, they don't know how to go human to human. So, you can't
equate Ebola with a coronavirus.
Ms. Malliotakis. Why do you think you were excluded from
those calls?
Dr. Redfield. Because it was told to me that they wanted a
single narrative, and that I obviously had a different point of
view.
Ms. Malliotakis. OK. In emails following the conference
call, four of the 11 scientists told Fauci that they all found
a genetic sequence inconsistent with expectations from
evolutionary theory, basically what you're saying. However,
just three days later, these four scientists had drafted a
paper arguing the exact opposite. And that's now the infamous
``Proximal Origin of SARS COVID 2.'' Our investigations show
this paper was prompted by Dr. Fauci among others with a goal
to disprove the lab leak theory.
What is the likelihood that these scientists came across
additional information just three days after making these
statements to conclude with such certainty that COVID-19 came
from nature instead of the lab leak that they thought it was
three days earlier?
Dr. Redfield. Yes. I think it's unfortunate. Again, I've
said this before, that this whole approach that was taken on
February 1, and subsequently in the month of February, if you
really want to be truthful, it's antithetical to science.
Ms. Malliotakis. Thank you.
Dr. Redfield. Science has debate, and they squashed any
debate.
Ms. Malliotakis. Thank you. Given what we know now and
looking at all of the conversations in February 2020 and before
the release of the paper, do you think that Dr. Fauci used this
paper to hide that gain-of-function research created this
virus?
Dr. Redfield. I can't talk about Fauci's motivation.
Ms. Malliotakis. Do you think that the paper does hide the
truth?
Dr. Redfield. I think it's an inaccurate paper that
basically was part of a narrative that they were creating.
Remember, this pandemic did not start in January at the seafood
market. We now know there was infections all the way back into
September. This was a narrative that was decided that they were
going to say that this came from the wet market, and they were
going to do everything they could to support it, to negate any
discussion about the possibility that this came from a
laboratory.
Ms. Malliotakis. I've got 20 seconds left. Dr. Fauci was
affirmatively told in an email that NIH had a monetary
relationship with the Wuhan Institute through EcoHealth
Alliance. He was told this on January 27, 2020.
Do you think that Dr. Fauci intentionally lied under oath
to Senator Paul when he vehemently denied NIH's funding of
gain-of-function research?
Dr. Redfield. I think there is no doubt that NIH was
funding gain-of-function research.
Ms. Malliotakis. Is it likely that American tax dollars
funded the gain-of-function research that created this virus?
Dr. Redfield. I think it did. Not only from NIH, but from
the State Department, USAID and from DOD.
Ms. Malliotakis. I'm out of time. Thank you very much.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Mrs. Dingell from Michigan
for five minutes of questions.
Mrs. Dingell. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
During the height of the COVID-19 pandemic, I found it very
disheartening to see public health professionals across this
country vilified and attacked for supporting COVID-19
mitigation measures, basic safety measures and later vaccines.
They were trying to keep people safe and prevent deaths. I want
everyone to know, I take this committee very seriously. I want
the facts.
Dr. Redfield will confirm to you, I was one of the first
people to call him about Wuhan, and had a lot of questions and
never let up. So, I want the facts. But I hope and say to my
colleagues on the other side, we cannot go down a dangerous
path by pushing unfounded conspiracies about Dr. Fauci and
other long-serving career public health officials. Here is the
reality, like many of you, I am reading many articles, not just
over the past weeks.
Dr. Redfield knows I've been on this from the beginning,
talked to researchers, doctors, frontline nurses, public health
officials. They all agree on one fact. After the billions of
dollars on pandemic era upgrades to labs and data and
surveyance, after all the studies and white papers about
emergency preparedness, the U.S. still lacks two things in the
public health arsenal: people and trust.
These continued smears on public health officials are
destroying them. I strongly urge everyone on this committee,
but my Republican colleagues specifically, from rehashing
unfounded theories that Dr. Fauci and other public health
experts have blocked investigations into the pandemic origins.
Let's get the facts. Dr. Fauci has said we need to get to the
bottom of how the novel coronavirus originated, and has said,
and I've heard him say, like I talked to Dr. Redfield, he has
an open mind about the virus' origins.
To all of you and all of us in this room, I say it's
critical to rebuild trust and that continued attacks on public
health officials only serves to further discredit people's
confidence in our public health institutions, makes it almost
impossible and it's challenging to recruit workers in the
field, and it undermines people's trust in science.
We're seeing it. We know the basic things like washing your
hands, covering your mouth when you cough, and immunizations
save lives. And yes, because of all what we're doing, people
aren't getting measles vaccines. They're not getting chicken
pox. We're seeing the return of diseases we haven't seen
before. We have to take seriously that this rhetoric is
perpetuating people's distrust in flu shots and many other
things. So, let's work together, all of my colleagues, to
protect the American people. That's our job.
Dr. Auwaerter, how does misinformation surrounding the
possible origins of COVID-19 and its spread damage the
relationship between doctors and patients?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, my sense is it's a very frequent
question that, you know, patients ask me in the office, What do
you think? And I don't have any direct knowledge, but it's
obviously on a lot of people's minds. And I think, if it was
handled objectively, it would be less political. And therefore,
it sort of removes out of the realm of also dovetailing with
other public health mitigation measures, which you so
appropriately put forward. You know, for the first part of the
pandemic, we all wore masks. I can tell you no one on my
faculty got COVID-19 until people started to not wear masks as
well.
I think the efforts of trying to just help the public early
on when we don't know a lot of information, we always tend to
be more conservative. And then as we gain knowledge,
recommendations evolve.
So, I think the origin story is important to help, again,
look forward and put forward measures to try to help anticipate
whether it's a zoonotic infection or was a lab-derived virus.
Mrs. Dingell. I'm going to have more questions for the
record, Mr. Chairman.
But I want to switch subjects. Today, there are a variety
of views within the intelligence community and around the world
on whether the virus originated in an accidental lab leak or
whether it occurred from a leak to animals to humans. And I
want to know that as much as anybody. But Dr. Auwaerter, is it
normal for different agencies within the intelligence community
to make different assessments of the likelihood of one origin
theory over the other?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I don't work in the government, but my
understanding just reading the newspapers are that the CIA has
not made any determination. Others have come to different
levels of conclusions, so it seems to me that there is a
difference of opinion.
Mrs. Dingell. And it's normal for scientists to disagree?
Dr. Auwaerter. Absolutely. I think debate there is always
the case, very few things we know for certain.
Mrs. Dingell. I yield back. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize the Chairman of the full
committee Mr. Comer, from Kentucky, for five minutes of
questions.
Mr. Comer. Thank you, Mr. Chairman.
One of the prevailing themes of the pandemic has been
scientists' use of the media to downplay the lab leak theory.
Mr. Wade, in your career you worked at Nature Magazine,
Science Magazine, and The New York Times. Would you agree that
the scientific establishment used the media to downplay the lab
leak theory?
Mr. Wade. That's a complicated issue, Mr. Comer. I think
the media was used in this particular campaign to establish
natural origin theory. The scientific community is very afraid
to speak up on political issues. I think the reason is that the
government grants are handed out through the system of peer
review committees. So, you don't want any single scientist on
your peer review committee to vote against you. Therefore--
because you won't get your grant it's so competitive. So,
therefore, scientists are very reluctant to say anything that
is politically divisive and might turn other scientists against
them. This means that they cannot be relied upon in the way
that I think we would like them to be independent and
forthright and call it as they see it.
Mr. Comer. OK. Well, we saw this first with the ``Proximal
Origin'' paper that said, ``Our analysis clearly showed that
COVID-19 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully
manipulated virus.'' This was first published on February 17 of
2020.
Each witness, I have a simple question, yes or no, was
there science available to make such an unequivocal statement
against the possibility of a lab leak that early on, February
2020?
Dr. Metzl?
Mr. Metzl. Absolutely, no.
Mr. Comer. Mr. Wade?
Mr. Wade. No, it was not.
Dr. Auwaerter. Yes. I don't have sufficient frame of
reference to give an answer.
Dr. Redfield. No.
Mr. Comer. Next, Peter Daszak of EcoHealth Alliance
orchestrated a letter in the Lancet, a prestigious journal, on
February 19, 2020, that said, ``We strongly condemn conspiracy
theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural
origin.''
Each witness, yes or no, is the possibility COVID-19 leaked
from a lab a conspiracy theory?
Mr. Metzl. Absolutely not.
Mr. Wade. No.
Dr. Auwaerter. I would say no, but also it has been
approached as such.
Dr. Redfield. No.
Mr. Comer. Dr. Redfield, I want to stick with you. You have
said before that you were locked out of conversations about the
lab leak by Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins.
Do you think they kept you out of the conversations because
you believe COVID-19 may have come from a lab?
Dr. Redfield. Yes. I think I made it very clear in January
to all of them why we had to aggressively pursue this. And I
let them know as a virologist that I didn't see that this was
anything like SARS or MERS because they never learned how to
transmit human to human, that I felt this virus was too
infectious for humans. There was a lot of evidence that lab
actually published in 2014 that they put the H2 receptor into
humanized mice so it can infect human tissue. I think, you
know, we had to really seriously go after the fact it came from
the lab, and they knew that that was how I was thinking.
Although, I thought we had to go after both hypotheses. I was
told later, I didn't know I was excluded. I didn't know there
was a February 1 conference call until the Freedom of
Information came out with the emails, and I was quite upset as
the CDC Director that I was excluded from those discussions.
Mr. Comer. Why would they do this?
Dr. Redfield. Because I had a different point of view and I
was told they made a decision that they would keep this
confidential until they came up with a single narrative, which
I will argue is antithetical to science. Science never selects
a single narrative. We foster, as my colleague here just said,
we foster debate. And we're confident that with debate, science
will eventually get to the truth. This was an a priori decision
that there's one point of view that we're going to put out
there, and anyone who doesn't agree with it is going to be
sidelined. And as I say, I was only the CDC director, and I was
sidelined.
Mr. Comer. Well, I think Dr. Fauci, Dr. Collins got caught
with their hand in the cookie jar. They got caught
supercharging viruses in an unsecure Chinese lab. They wanted
push the envelope, and so, they got together to cover
themselves, cover up their story, and wipe their fingerprint of
the virus that has killed more than one million Americans. Now
to quote Jurassic Park, they were, ``so preoccupied with
whether or not they could, they didn't stop to think if they
should.''
I look forward to the rest of the testimony today, and I
look forward to the great work of this subcommittee. Mr. Chair,
I yield back.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Mr. Mfume from Maryland for
five minutes of questions.
Mr. Mfume. Thank you very much. Mr. Chairman, I want to
thank you and the Ranking Member for convening us on this very
important and difficult topic. One that all Americans,
regardless of where they live, regardless of what they do are
concerned about. And I had come to this hearing expecting, Mr.
Chairman, that we would find a way to peel off the things that
didn't matter so that we could get to the things that did
matter, whether it was a lab leak, or an infection through
animals. I think we've got to pursue both of those paths if we
are ever to get the truth.
However, I must go back to what my Ranking Member said,
that I am a bit appalled that this hearing now gets layered
over with the issue of race in a very strong way with the
presence of Mr. Wade. Mr. Wade, I have read your book, and I'm
appalled by it. I would hope that giving you this platform does
not paint or taint the issue that we're trying to get to and
deal with here. You're not a physician. You are not a
physician's assistant. You are not a scientist. You have never
done a peer-reviewed paper. And yet, you've got an opinion,
which is fine, except that it's steeped in this conspiracy
theory that somehow or another, minorities are so genetically
different that they are culpable in some sort of way. I just
don't like that at all.
In your book, ``The Troublesome Inheritance,'' you talk
about a number of different things--and David Duke talks about
it--and says that he really endorses your position on Blacks
and Jews. The book was championed by the infamous white
supremacists, Jared Taylor, John Demarchar, and Steve Sailer.
The book has been promoted on a neo-Nazi forum that is linked
to almost 100 racially motivated attempted murders over the
last five years. It troubles me that--and I'm going to ask
unanimous consent, Mr. Chairman, that The New York Times piece
for which you wrote actually said that your theory has come off
at the wheels, particularly, when you talk about east Asians
and their genetic makeup.
I would like to ask that the David Duke statement and the
copy from his website be entered into the record. And I'd like
that the Southern Poverty Law Center, which tracks these things
annually, and their assessment, which is similar, be added to
the record.
Dr. Wenstrup. Without objection.
Mr. Mfume. Now, I've got to tell you, I spent five terms in
this body. I was so troubled by what I saw in the streets with
bias and hate crimes that I actually gave up my seat in the
Congress, and I went back to work in community groups. I ended
up being the president of the NAACP so that, nationally, I
could work against this sort of thing. It is repulsive. So,
here I am back again hearing the issues that drove me out of
here to begin with. I don't want to take away from this
hearing. I don't want to take away from what I said earlier is
that we've got to go down both paths. It just burns me that I
would know that I'm doing that on a forum where somebody with
these sort of beliefs is also a part of.
Mr. Auwaerter, I want to go to you for minute. I know you
don't represent Johns Hopkins, you are representing the
Association on Infectious Diseases. I have a lot of----
Mr. Wade. Excuse me, sir, do I get the chance to respond
briefly.
Mr. Mfume. It's my time. No, you do not.
Mr. Wade. OK.
Mr. Mfume. I have a lot of respect for Hopkins. I spent 10
years on the board of trustees there. I'm a graduate of the
institution. I know that you speak with a great deal of
background. And even though, in this instance, you're speaking
on the Association of Infectious Diseases, I take all of that
very seriously. And I want to ask you one quick thing here
about going down both of these paths. How much can you say, in
a short period of time, does the information obtained through
this hearing and other hearings and the intelligence community,
how very important is that to bolstering the efforts to prepare
for any future pandemics?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I think, obviously, getting to the
origins is on everyone's mind. But also understanding what
happened should also help prepare us for moving ahead. And I
can't overstate the needs in our public health, which have been
generally less well-funded than other measures and other
diseases to help protect our country.
Mr. Mfume. Thank you. I've got to reclaim the little bit of
time that we have left. And, Mr. Wade, let me just say this,
personally, for a race of people who have suffered, endured,
and survived three centuries of slavery, oppression,
deprivation, degradation, denial, and disprivilege, I'm
absolutely offended that you would have the opportunity to take
this platform and to add anything of significance to it. I
yield back.
Mr. Wade. Well, I don't have anything in common with the
White supremacists.
Dr. Wenstrup. Mr. Wade, hold on a second. Hold on a second.
I do think that Mr. Wade deserves the opportunity to take two
minutes to respond to accusations made. But I do want to get
back to the topic at hand which is the origins of COVID-19.
Mr. Wade. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I'm sorry for this
distraction from the work of the committee. I'm sorry, too,
that Mr. Mfume did not like my book. I'm not a racist. I don't
have anything in common with the views of White supremacists--
--
Mr. Mfume. They love you, though.
Mr. Wade [continuing]. Just because David Duke likes my
book.
Dr. Wenstrup. Mr. Mfume, would you please let him respond?
He did not interrupt you.
Mr. Mfume. I didn't know that he got time to respond.
Dr. Wenstrup. Chairman's decision.
Mr. Wade. It's a not very good argument that David Duke
likes my book. He maybe he likes many things, but that doesn't
mean to say they're all wrong. I did write my book for him. I
also made the clearest possible distinction between writing
about the biology of race, which is a purely scientific issue
and racist statements, which I have absolutely no sympathy. My
book is explicitly antiracist. I stress the fact that we are
all variations on the same human genome, which I think is a
very important and unifying fact. I think the arguments made
against the book were for entirely political reasons. Various
[inaudible] led to the 120 scientists who attacked my book
in Science as well as a nice story about Einstein. Someone told
him 100 scientists had written a book saying he was wrong. And
he replied, ``Well, if I were wrong, one would have been
enough.'' That's how science works, not on the number of people
against it, it works on facts. And those letter writers had no
good point and no mistake in my book. So, I don't think that
their criticism should be taken carefully. I'm sorry for the
disruption and unhappiness this issue has caused and let's get
back to the issue of the hearing, Mr. Chairman.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you. I now recognize Dr. Miller-Meeks
from Iowa for five minutes of questions.
Dr. Miller-Meeks. Thank you so much, Chair Wenstrup. And
thank you to all of our witnesses who are here today. I'm both
a doctor and former director of the Iowa Department of Public
Health as well as a military veteran of 24 years. Like Dr.
Metzl said, I have waited three years for this hearing. And I
have, in fact, put people over politics and science over
conspiracy. Our first inquiry on the Select Subcommittee on the
Coronavirus Crisis--this is my third year on this committee--
was June 29, 2021, on origins of COVID-19, and the only people
that attended were Republicans.
We had a press conference at that hearing, and I was
concerned that the public and the press weren't conveying that
it wasn't partisan in trying to determine origins. It was, in
fact, of utmost importance, and importance not just to
Americans, but to the international community. At that press
conference on June 29, 2021, I said: The reason we with need to
know the origins of COVID-19 is to prevent and prepare for the
next pandemic. We need to know, one, there are immediate
disclosure rules. There was not immediate disclosure of a virus
that would lead to a worldwide pandemic. Immediate disclosure
and WHO has a vested interest in this in making sure there's
compliance.
Laboratory safety: it was known, even in the U.S., there
are labs who have lab leaks, laboratory safety, biosafety lab
for working being done in a biosafety lab too. It was known
that this was occurring at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. So,
lab safety. And, third, and I think Dr. Redfield has mentioned
this--all of you have mentioned this--and that is, the ethics
of gain-of-function research, or types of research. Often, we
as scientists get ahead of the ethics. But the ethics of types
of research, and again, the international community has a
vested interest in discussing and debating these topics. I have
published in journals before, peer-reviewed journals. I know
how the editing and the peer-review process works. I also know
very intimately of the disclosure requirements and conflicts of
interest, including financial.
Over the weekend, we released new emails and documents that
suggested that Dr. Fauci prompted the drafting of a
publication, ultimately, called ``Proximal Origins,'' that
would disprove the lab leak theory. The authors of this paper
skewed available evidence to achieve that goal. And Dr. Jeremy
Farrar, now chief scientist for the World Health Organization,
went uncredited despite significant involvement.
Are you all aware of these documents? And just nod
affirmatively. All of the witnesses except one have nodded yes.
You know, many of you have been in journalism and in science
writing for a long time. Dr. Metzl, can you explain the process
briefly, because I have little time, of drafting, editing, and
reviewing a publication in a science magazine.
Mr. Metzl. Well, Mr. Wade is probably better at this than
me because he was an editor of two science magazines. But what
I will say is different people contribute, and it's normal
practice, to attribute, to list the names of the people who
have participated.
Dr. Miller-Meeks. And, then, Mr. Wade, given that
acknowledgment, so do you think it's important that there is
proper crediting and acknowledging of authors?
Mr. Wade. I think the question of who is or is not an
author of a paper is somewhat loose. So many people interpret
it different ways. I think it's called honorary authorships
where you talk to someone in an elevator and say, well, I'll
add you to my paper. It's not a very--there are no hard-and-
fast rules for who should be author of a paper.
Dr. Miller-Meeks. But if an individual is the genesis of
that paper, do you think they should be acknowledged.
Mr. Wade. Well, if they make some important intellectual
contribution to it, they should. I don't know that Farrar did
or was in a position to. All we know is that he suggested a
minor editing change to the paper.
Dr. Miller-Meeks. And Dr. Auwaerter, you mentioned that we
know the intermediate host for SARS. How long did it take for
us to find the intermediate host for SARS?
Dr. Auwaerter. It did take a few years. It was not
immediate.
Dr. Miller-Meeks. And MERS.
Dr. Auwaerter. MERS also took sometime.
Dr. Miller-Meeks. Are any of you aware of a furin cleavage
site occurring naturally? Dr. Metzl, go ahead.
Mr. Metzl. They occurred naturally, but not in SARS-like
viruses, other than SARS-CoV-2.
Dr. Miller-Meeks. So, in other viruses, but not in SARS,
and SARS-CoV-2 very similar to SARS-CoV-2.
Mr. Metzl. Correct. In no SARS-like viruses, and it showed
up for the first time in a SARS-like virus, in the SARS-CoV-2
virus, which seemed to appear out of nowhere.
Dr. Miller-Meeks. Yes. The endonuclease's fingerprint, how
common does that occur? The repeating cycle CG-GC-GG and----
Mr. Metzl. The furin cleavage sites.
Mr. Wade. Well----
Dr. Miller-Meeks. The point in that is that there is, as
you said, Dr. Metzl, extraordinary circumstantial evidence that
this came from a lab. I don't know why the authors didn't want
to state this, they did not want to have the scientific
conversation and dialog; why they wanted to obfuscate and
suppress the truth, or even have a debate about the origins of
COVID-19. Was it for personal financial gain? Was it to hide
U.S. financial interest into the Wuhan Institute of Virology
indirectly? Was it to suppress the revelation that there was,
perhaps, gain-of-function research that had been prohibited in
the United States? Or were they concerned that a conspiracy
would develop that it was bioterrorism? And I would state that
their suppression and obfuscation has led to the exact mistrust
and distrust and conspiracy theories that they may have tried
to avoid. Thank you so much. I'm so delighted to have this
hearing, and I think we will be able to get to the bottom of
this, have an open dialog. What they did is not science, and it
will not prevent you from future pandemics----
Dr. Wenstrup. Your time has expired. I now recognize Ms.
Ross from North Carolina for five minutes of questions.
Ms. Ross. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I just want to
be very clear to our distinguished panelists and to the folks
who are watching this. My Democratic colleagues and I strongly
support the experts' community's effort to determine the
origins of the novel coronavirus. Because doing so is critical
to preventing and preparing for future pandemics, plain and
simple.
And as stated, almost 1.2 million Americans have lost their
lives due to COVID-19, and millions more around the world. It's
very personal to each of us. More than 30,000 people in my home
state have died because of this pandemic. And our goal here
should be to prevent something like this from happening again,
which is why science and facts should guide legitimate
investigations into the pandemic's origins. And as has been
said by my colleague on the other side of the aisle, we must
put people over politics.
So, Dr. Auwaerter, I just want to ask you my first
question. How does promoting our understanding of the novel
coronavirus' origins help us prevent and prepare for future
pandemics?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, I think there are two main avenues.
One is if it is of animal origin, we need to anticipate
additional viruses, or even potentially bacteria. And
therefore, having an advance notice, an early notice as
possible, certainly is helpful for containment and also
mitigation measures. This, no doubt, would need to be
cooperation with other countries, public health agencies to
build that infrastructure.
On the other hand, if it's a lab-derived virus, then
guidance in terms of proper research and guardrails is highly
important to make sure, to the best of abilities, this never
happens again. Much as we take great care with airline safety,
nuclear weapons, and so on, all of that needs to be paid
attention to.
Mr. Ross. Thank you. Dozens of scientific research studies
have been completed or are currently underway to promote our
understanding of how the novel coronavirus came to be.
Under President Biden's leadership--and we heard a little
bit from our colleague Mr. Raskin about President Trump's
initial response to this--but under President Biden's
leadership, the intelligence community has taken decisive
action to get to the bottom of the novel coronavirus' origins.
And we have seen some new releases from different departments
about their ongoing findings.
Dr. Auwaerter, can you tell us about the importance of the
objectivity of these investigations?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, as a clinician and someone that does
research, I think the objectivity is very important. Obviously,
not all information is available to us that has based the
conclusions. Those are outside of my expertise as to whether
that's the case. But I think the objectivity is highly
important, and also the fact of how it's rated. You know, low
confidence means exactly what I think it means, that there's a
fair amount of uncertainty.
Mr. Ross. OK. Final question, congressional investigations
designed to villainize or discredit public health experts,
undermine our public health institutions and sometimes can
spread dangerous misinformation, which itself can metastasize.
Dr. Auwaerter, instead of launching a partisan
investigation or politicizing the pandemic's origin, what
should Congress be doing to prevent something like this from
happening again?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, outside of the political realm, I
would just say an independent body would make the most sense
that is not cueing, essentially, or have the ability to make
much political hay, if that's possible. I'm not sure of the
details of that. But to me, that seems to be the ideal.
Ms. Ross. Thank you very much. I would like yield the
remainder of my time to my colleague, Congressman Mfume.
Mr. Mfume. Oh, thank you very, very much for that. I want
to go back and underscore, if I might, how I began my comments
because I don't want that lost on those who are here or those
who are watching. This is designed--and again, I want to
commend the Chair and the Ranking Member Ruiz for making sure
that we move down a path together. Together, Democrats and
Republicans trying to get answers for the American people, not
just about what happened, but as has been said so that it never
happens again. And if it does, we are prepared.
And I put so much emphasis on science because I spent five
years at the NIH, at the Institute for Minority Health and
Health Disparities. I was the executive director of the
National Medical Association. And up until two years ago, I
have served as Vice President of Research America, the largest
research advocacy organization in the country. This is real to
me. This is very personal. And I just can't even fathom the
thought of people still dying as a result of this until we have
our work completed. Thank you. I yield back.
Mr. Wenstrup. Thank you. I now recognize Ms. Lesko from
Arizona for five minutes of questions.
Mrs. Lesko. Thank you, Mr. Chair. In Rep. Ruiz's opening
statement, he said he doesn't want the COVID-19 investigation
to be political. I couldn't agree more. Yet in the next breath,
he accused one of the witnesses of writing a white supremacist
book, which is a political salvo designed to discredit the
witness. Then his first question wasn't about COVID-19 at all,
it was all about a non-COVID-related book that Dr. Wade wrote
in the past. And a poster board was held over his head designed
for political theatre. Then Rep. Raskin went after President
Trump for five minutes instead of asking a question.
With all due respect, I contend that some of my Democratic
colleagues are the ones making the COVID investigation
political. Why they don't want to investigate the origins of
COVID-19 that killed millions of people, I will never
understand.
My first question is for Dr. Redfield. A witness in our
roundtable last week said that it was a no-brainer that the
virus came from the Wuhan lab. When you were Director of the
CDC, did Dr. Fauci ever explain to you why he didn't believe
the virus came from the Wuhan lab and why he actively worked to
silence that theory?
Dr. Redfield. Dr. Fauci's position as those who thought a
spillover took the position that it was most likely a spillover
event because that's what happened with SARS, and that's what
happened with MERS. Alright. And I think it's important to look
at, prior to 2012, we didn't really have another mechanism
other than nature. We weren't doing gain-of-function research.
I'm a clinical virologist. I tried to explain to Dr. Fauci,
who's an immunologist, that this virus, SARS and MERS, when
they infected man from the intermediate host, civic cat in the
case of SARS and a camel in the case of MERS, they never
learned how to go human to human. So, those original outbreaks
are less than 1,000 people, and the epidemics died. When
everyone thought this was SARS-like, well, it's going to die
too. But this virus was immediately the most infectious virus--
not the most, I think probably right behind measles--virus that
we've seen infect man.
So, I immediately said, wait a second, this isn't natural.
And then you go back and look at the literature and you find in
2014 this lab actually published a paper that they put the H2
receptor into humanized mice so it can infect human tissue. And
then you learn that the new COVID, which came from bats, now
can hardly replicate in bats.
Mrs. Lesko. Yes.
Dr. Redfield. So, how does that happen? So, I had said that
my view as a virologist--again, my hypothesis--and I never
discredit them for their hypothesis, the spillover--was that
this was--most likely come from the lab. And we need to
aggressively investigate both hypotheses.
Mrs. Lesko. Thank you. Thank you very much. I have another
question for you, Dr. Redfield. In a recent Energy and Commerce
Oversight hearing, I asked the NIH acting director about the
NIH's gross negligence in monitoring the EcoHealth Alliance
grant and subgrant to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. He
admitted that we might not have had all of the information and
research reports from WIV and EcoHealth. He insisted, however,
that he was sure that the coronavirus research at WIV was
completely unrelated to SARS-COVID-2.
With the information we know and the fact that China
deleted data and asked NIH to delete data, do you believe that
we can have certainty that the virus did not come from the
Wuhan lab and that U.S. funding was not used for COVID-19-
related research?
Dr. Redfield. Yes, absolutely, we can't do that. I will say
if you go back and look--it's declassified now, and I'm sure
you all have your classified briefings, but the declassified
information now. In September 2019, three things happened in
that lab: One is they deleted the sequences. That's highly
irregular. Researchers don't usually like to do that. The
second thing they did was they changed the command and control
of the lab from the civilian control to the military control.
Highly unusual. I've been involved in dual use labs when I was
in the military. And the third thing they did, which I think is
really telling, is they let a contractor redo the ventilation
system in that laboratory.
So, I think clearly there was strong evidence that there
was a significant event that happened in that laboratory in
September. It's now been declassified. You can read it. I'm
sure there's more classified information around it.
Mrs. Lesko. Thank you. Dr. Redfield, The New York Post
reported that you stated: I could use the word ``coverup,'' but
I don't know that, so I'm not going to speculate that. Do you
believe there was a coverup? And if so, why would the Federal
agencies work with legacy media to silence scientists and other
Americans asking questions about the origins of SARS-CoV-2?
Dr. Redfield. Yes, and I'm not a big fan of quoting The New
York Post. I don't think I used the word ``coverup.'' OK. I
think there was an attempt to misguide, redirect the debate,
but I wouldn't have used the word ``coverup.''
Mrs. Lesko. Thank you very much. And I yield back.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Dr. Bera from California for
five minutes of questions.
Dr. Bera. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. You know, from day one
of this pandemic, unfortunately, politics has kind of infused a
lot of this. And I know this--you know, obviously, Dr.
Redfield, you and I had many conversations. In my time in
Congress, you know, one of my focus areas has been global
health security pandemic preparedness. I've sat on national
task forces at CSIS to prepare for global health securities. We
put out a recommendation, but, unfortunately, in the fall of
2019, and had pushed to put that framework in place.
My colleagues, Congresswoman Dingell and Congressman Ross
have equivocally said, as Democrats, we want to find out what
the origins of COVID were.
Early on in the pandemic, in January 2020, I pushed,
personally, as hard as I could on the Trump Administration to
do everything they could to get our scientists to the hot zone,
to ground zero, to actually get a sense of what was going on. I
am not going to defend how the Chinese Communist Party has
handled this pandemic. They've stonewalled us. They've played
politics. They've--you know, Dr. Metzl, you talked about the
importance of WHO. They played politics with the WHO
recommendations. And until we actually can get to the hot zone,
until we--you know, I don't know that we'll ever get the data.
This is not a partisan issue. In fact, on the Intelligence
Committee, which the Chairman is on, we marked up a COVID-19
Origins Act in a nonpartisan way. It passed out of markup with
a voice vote. We will all get a chance to vote on that bill on
Friday. I think you will see a strong bipartisan vote
encouraging the intelligence community to declassify as much
information as possible so the public can see the information
that we have. It's not conclusive, but we've got to continue to
try to find the COVID origins.
I think it is reprehensible that we're disparaging some of
our greatest public health individuals. Dr. Fauci, who I have
known for a long time, and Francis Collins, who I've gotten to
know, both are outstanding scientists, and so forth. They may
have had a different hypothesis. We should entertain all
hypothesis, and we should do it in an objective way to find the
answers. I also hope we don't as a body take the wrong lessons
from this.
Dr. Metzl, you talked the importance of the WHO. I would
like your opinion on--international collaboration is extremely
important, not just in pandemic preparedness, but also in
biosecurity work, and so forth. We have to have the systems in
place to identify pandemics fairly quickly, to think about how
we address it, because, you know, whether this was man-made or
naturally occurring, bad actors are out there who just saw what
a virus did to the entire planet. Those technologies are
readily available. You come from a national security
background. How important is it to work with our international
partners here?
Mr. Metzl. It's absolutely essential that we work with our
international partners and with the WHO. And as it's been said
repeatedly, when those international partners, or potential
partners themselves are bad actors, which is absolutely the
case with China, that makes things a lot more difficult. And
then the World Health Organization, which is absolutely
essential, is working with one hand tied behind its back. It
doesn't have the mandate or the authority to do what it needs
to do. It couldn't have its own independent surveillance
capability in the beginning of the pandemic. When China was
preventing the WHO investigators from going to Wuhan, there was
nothing that they could do. And as I had said in my remarks,
Dr. Tedros has actually really been at the forefront of
fighting for the kind of open inquiry that the Chinese
government has so aggressively blocked.
If I can just say, just very quickly, I'm originally from
Kansas City. I'm a Midwestern optimist and so, I hear some
consensus in the room that it's critically important to
understand how the pandemic started; that we have to fully
examine all origin hypotheses.
It's my view, as I have said before, that China must be the
primary focus but we also have to look at everything, including
ourselves.
But if we make this process primarily about Dr. Fauci--even
though we need to look at everything--if we make it primarily
about Dr. Fauci, we would be inappropriately serving the
Chinese government a propaganda coup on a silver platter.
Dr. Bera. I couldn't agree with you more. Let's get to the
facts. Let's discover the origins. Let's do what we can to
prevent the next pandemic. Let's increase our biosafety and
biosecurity. You know, we should debate gain-of-function
research. I think that's totally appropriate. We should make
sure if we are looking at that, that it is done in an absolute
safe way with oversight, et cetera. We should also think about
the private sector that can operate, you know, do this research
on their own. We ought to think about how we also look at that
and make that safer. Thank you.
Dr. Wenstrup. Now I recognize Mr. Cloud for five minutes of
questions.
Mr. Cloud. Thank you, Chairman, and thank you all for being
here. Thank you for your work in science and for yielding your
wisdom in this effort to us today.
Dr. Metzl, I wanted to ask you, you mentioned that there
were scientists who refused to be silenced, insinuating that
there were efforts to silence. And I was just wondering if you
could kind of brief what some of those efforts were?
Mr. Metzl. Sure. So, when a small handful of us, in the
earliest days of the pandemic, began raising the possibility of
possible lab origin, there was just, as I said, ferociously
strong headwinds. There was this manufactured consensus. And I
kept digging. And like I said before, I'm a lifelong Democrat.
I consider myself a progressive person, but I kept digging. I
couldn't find the justification for these strong arguments,
calling people like me, investigating, looking into pandemic
origins in good faith, conspiracy theorists. And it was very
difficult. So, we had a small group that formed later in 2020
that is--others have called the Paris Group--all of the members
of that community were aggressively trying to place scientific
papers with journals and had zero success.
So, there was a wall that was extremely difficult to get
over, which is why, what I said to this group is, look, we have
to try to get around that wall. And that's why we published our
four open letters that I believe played significant role in,
along with other things, of starting to shift at this
conversation. But it took more than a year of this kind of
aggressive work to even start to begin that type of change.
Mr. Cloud. And some of that pushback came from our
government, too. Is that correct?
Mr. Metzl. Well, it was mixed--I mean, certainly, from what
we've heard, there were leaders of the U.S. Government who--Dr.
Fauci had said he was open to all possibilities. But then the
next sentence was the preponderance of science suggests a
natural origin. I'm a fan of Dr. Fauci, but I would--I don't
like to scream at the television, but when I heard those words,
I would say, well, no, no, that's not the case. That's not what
the science, at least as I'm reading it, is saying.
Mr. Cloud. And to what you were just saying, Forbes
mentioned you as one of the first as an ex-high official----
Mr. Metzl. Yes.
Mr. Cloud [continuing]. High-level staffer for Bill Clinton
and then Senator Joe Biden to say that SARS coronavirus was
likely a Wuhan lab escapee. Why did you think that?
Mr. Metzl. So, in the early days of January 2020, like
everybody, I was trying to figure out what was happening. And I
read the news reports, and it said it comes from the market.
And SARS-2 sounded kind of like SARS-1, and that seemed
credible. But I had just been in Wuhan, China. So, I think a
lot of Americans had this vision of Wuhan as some little market
town where a bunch of yokels are eating bats for dinner every
night. But Wuhan is China's Chicago. It's an incredibly
sophisticated, highly educated, wealthy city. I knew that the
Wuhan Institute of Virology was based there. I knew a lot about
that background. I also had an understanding both of the
science and of China. And then on January 24 of 2020, there was
a Lancet paper written by Chinese scientists saying that more
than a third of the earliest cases of infection were of people
who had no connection to the market. So, in my mind, that was a
pretty strong piece of evidence that the market was a super
spreader place, which certainly is what I still believe. And
that was when I started digging.
And then in later February 2020, I had all of these ideas I
was developing. I went to South Africa for the meeting of our
World Health Organization expert advisory committee on human
genome editing. And this is with some of the top scientists and
others in the world. And then privately, I was telling people,
like, here is my private view. Here is what I'm seeing in the
evidence. And there was a part of me that was kind of hoping
that they would say, Oh, no, you're crazy. Here is what you're
missing. Because, you know, this is an uncomfortable hypothesis
for many reasons. That wasn't--now, certainly, nobody was
saying that. And that was why when I came back after those
meetings, I became very, very public, and then I launched my
website and wrote a number of editorials in March and early
April.
Mr. Cloud. I want to try to get another question in here.
Your take on this, was that before or after ``Proximal
Origins'' came out?
Mr. Metzl. So, before----
Mr. Cloud. And what was your take on that when you, I
guess, read that----
Mr. Metzl. Yes.
Mr. Cloud [continuing]. And what impact do you think that
had on the scientific community----
Mr. Metzl. It's a----
Mr. Cloud [continuing]. And the free discovery, so to speak
of----
Mr. Metzl. It's a great question. Just, I don't mean to be
overly referenced in my own background, but I'm pro-science,
pro-vaccine. I believe climate change is real. But when I saw
that, I was monumentally--I won't use--I'll say, upset, angry.
Because without the available evidence, these absolute claims
were being made. And I was really digging, and there just
wasn't the evidence to make those assertions.
So, the right position in the beginning was what everybody
is saying now. It could have been natural origin. It could have
been a lab origin. And we need to actively and aggressively
investigate all relevant hypotheses. And it's very unfortunate
that wasn't the case.
Mr. Cloud. And of course, the question we'll have to get to
later is why was this--all the data deleted and everything.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Mr. Garcia from California
for five minutes of questions.
Mr. Garcia. Thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. I want to
thank, of course, all of our witnesses as well for being here.
We all care deeply about the work of this select subcommittee.
I think it's critical. And we all can agree that we learn as
much as about the COVID-19 origins as we can. We know that
preventing future pandemics saves lives. That's what this is
all about. That's what this committee is all about.
We have lost over 1 million American lives in this country,
many more across the world. A lot of folks know I lost both my
mother and my stepfather to the pandemic early on, so that I
understand the human cost and tragedy of this virus.
I'm very grateful that in May 2021, President Biden ordered
the intelligence community to investigate the origins of COVID-
19. He specifically requested the Department of Energy be
brought into as part of this important assessment. This has
been discussed today. We know that this is critical work that's
been happening. We also know that one way or another, we don't
have clear proof about the origins of COVID-19. And this has
been shared by our witnesses, and of course in the many reports
that have been produced by our agencies.
Now, we can make convincing cases, of course, for both
potential lab leak, or if there was transmission from animals,
but no one can say for certain where exactly the origins are
today. And I think I want to repeat that so that it can be very
clear to the American public as far as where we're actually at
in this process and in these investigations. Multiple Federal
agencies have supported both sides of the question and none
with high confidence.
One of the most important lessons that we can learn from
the origins of COVID-19 is how we can better respond to future
viruses and future pandemics, because there will be future
pandemics. We've seen the mass death, the devastation this has
caused our economy and the American public and the global
public. And we also need to know and understand what mistakes
were made in the past so that we can correct them in the
future.
We know, for example, that President Trump's own advisor on
COVID-19, who we heard a lot from during the pandemic, Dr.
Birx, had said that the previous administration's policies
early in the pandemic possibly cost us hundreds of thousands of
American lives.
And I want to also note something that was said. We know
that on more than 20 separate occasions, President Trump
defended President Xi and his handling of COVID-19. We've been
talking a lot about China and Chinese origins. But it's
important to talk also about what the former President's
comments were.
So, even as we had concerns about China's lack of
transparency early on in the crisis, President Trump would
consistently praise President Xi, in fact, on 20 separate
occasions.
I want to quote something former President Trump said,
``Last night, I spoke to President Xi. We talked about the
experience that they had in China and of all the things that
have taken place, and we learned a lot. They've had a very
tough experience, and they're doing well, and he is doing well.
President Xi is doing very well. But we learned a lot, and we
have great communication together. We're going to be sent great
data from China.''
Now, it's very clear that that great data actually never
came, and there was never really the cooperation that the
President--that the former administration said that we were
going to have. And over and over again, President Trump's
Administration coddled the Chinese government and told us that
this was all going to work out just fine, even though his
doctors and scientists disagreed.
If members of this subcommittee are as concerned about role
of the Chinese government in the origins of the pandemic, then
we also need to take a serious look at why the former President
repeatedly praised China and downplayed a virus that has gone
on to kill over a million Americans. That is the work that the
subcommittee should also be focused on.
Dr. Redfield, I know you mentioned in a New York Times
interview that your greatest disappointment was lack of
constant public health messages from civic leaders. And so my
question is, is it fair to say that misinformation was a major
public health threat?
Dr. Redfield. I think that getting accurate information to
the American public was really important. I was extremely
disappointed as CDC Director that I was restricted from being
able to communicate to the American public. I though that was a
disservice.
Mr. Garcia. And do you think that politicians who spread
misinformation make the pandemic worse? And would it be fair to
say that politicians who promote vaccine hesitancy actually
cost lives?
Dr. Redfield. I think there's a number of issues. Clearly,
vaccine hesitancy is one of our greatest threats. As you know,
as CDC Director, I took it on head on when I found out that,
you know, we had over 360,000 people die of flu in the decade
before I was CDC Director and less than 50 percent of American
public takes the flu vaccine. So, I try to get over that.
I do think--and this is different--I think one of the ways
you promoted vaccine hesitancy, though, that wasn't the intent.
I do think when we got into vaccine mandates, that helped
reinforce vaccine hesitancy. So, vaccine hesitancy is a threat.
We need to address it.
Mr. Garcia. Thank you very much, sir. And I think that's
important to also note vaccine hesitancy has been promoted
actually by some members of this committee is actually very
dangerous as has been said by you and many doctors across the
country.
Just quickly, Mr. Redfield, according to your March 17,
2022, transcribed interview with the Select Subcommittee on the
Coronavirus Crisis, you had a team of CDC investigators prepare
to go to China in early January 2020. Is that correct?
Dr. Redfield. Correct.
Mr. Garcia. But President Trump was not successful in
deploying this team to China. Is that also correct?
Dr. Redfield. Correct.
Mr. Garcia. Well, thank you very much. Mr. Chairman, I
yield back.
Mr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Dr. Joyce from Pennsylvania
for five minutes of questions.
Dr. Joyce. Thank you for yielding. And thank you to our
witness panel for appearing here today.
Dr. Redfield, thank you for appearing and discussing these
important matters. One of the biggest problems for our country
going forward has been the erosion of public trust in our
public health authorities, both at a national and at an
international level. I believe that the work this committee
will do on getting to the bottom of the origins of this virus
will be critical in restoring that trust. And to that end, the
House of Representatives will be voting on legislation, this
week, requiring that the Director of the National Intelligence
Agency to declassify all information relating to the origins of
COVID-19, especially if there is reason to believe that the
Wuhan Institute of Virology is a source of this outbreak.
Dr. Redfield, how important is this level of transparency
to restore trust with the American public?
Dr. Redfield. You know, I thought about this a lot of how
we're going to get to the answer that you're striving to get
to: What is the origin? I don't think that answer's going to
come from the scientific community. I think that answer's going
to come from the intelligence community. And we need to get the
intelligence community--and you all have the way to do that--I
would like to have you have each of them show what data they
have, where they got it, who their informants were, and what
their conclusions were. Because as you know, a number of them
are on the fence. They don't say yes or no. You got the FBI and
the Energy Department, which I have a lot of respect for.
Because when you look at those two departments, the FBI and the
Energy Department have the strongest scientific footprint of
any of our intelligence agencies. And I think the way they got
to the answers of low probability and moderate probability is
their internal scientists did the science.
Dr. Joyce. So, yes or no? Do you support the
declassification of all information relating to the origins of
the COVID virus?
Dr. Redfield. I think declassification is very important.
The only caveat that I would say is there are some method and
sources issues that I think you guys are going to have to
wrestle with to see if they're compromised by some of the
declassification.
Dr. Joyce. And I think that the erosion of the trust of the
American people needs to be reestablished, and part of that is
obtained.
Dr. Redfield. I agree with you. I agree with you.
Dr. Joyce. I also mentioned that there's a loss of trust on
international levels. And I constantly hear that from my
constituents back home in Pennsylvania over the issues,
specifically, regarding the World Health Organization by
kowtowing to the Chinese Community Party who showed, at every
step, an unwillingness to be honest and transparent about the
timing, the severity, and the origins of the outbreak. They
badly damaged their reputation.
Dr. Metzl, Article 6 of the International Health
Regulations requires that the World Health Organization
notifies within 24 hours of all events which may constitute a
public health emergency of international concern.
Do you believe that the Chinese Communist Party complied
with this requirement given the reports that the CCP had
identified COVID cases as early as November 2019?
Mr. Metzl. There can be no doubt, whatsoever, that the
Chinese government violated the IHR.
Dr. Joyce. Do you feel that there's an opportunity from our
group, our work here to reestablish potential trust in the
World Health Organization?
Mr. Metzl. Well, that's a separate issue. Certainly, in the
earliest days of the pandemic, Dr. Tedros, by his own
admission, was saying too many nice things about the--about the
Chinese government, when the Chinese government was very
clearly not providing the WHO the information that the WHO was
privately asking for. But as I said earlier, Dr. Tedros, then
was the essential voice after the deeply flawed Chinese
International Joint Study in February 2021. If Dr. Tedros had
not spoken up, basically condemning this deeply flawed report
and then abolishing the entire--this entire group, we would be
in a very different situation today.
Dr. Joyce. The CCP was given full veto authority over those
included on the investigation team. And coincidentally, the
only American accepted was Peter Daszak who is CEO of
EcoHealth. Sort of like having the fox in the hen house.
With this information, do you believe that the conclusions
of the report can be trusted? And is there a serious conflict
by Daszak's inclusion in the investigation team?
Mr. Metzl. So, as I've said many times, the entire process
was flawed for the joint study. And that was a joint study not
originated by the WHO Secretariat, but by the World Health
Assembly, which is the governing body of states overseeing the
WHO. So, this was forced on the WHO. The report of the Chinese
International Group, in my view, was so deeply and
fundamentally flawed that it's outrageous. But the WHO
Secretariat, they were the ones who then--Dr. Tedros rejected
the findings. And then the WHO Secretariat abolished that group
and established a new group, the Scientific Advisory Group on
the Origin of Novel Pathogens. And that group came out with
this report that was saying that we have to fully investigate a
lab origin, and they've called on China to be more cooperative.
And China is again stonewalling.
Dr. Joyce. I agree that that full investigation of a lab
origin is the responsibility of this committee. I thank all of
the panel members for being here today. And Mr. Chairman, I
yield.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Ms. Tokuda from Hawaii for
five minutes.
Ms. Tokuda. Thank you, Mr. Chair. Following up on the
gentleman from Maryland's comments, as an Asian American woman
representing an ethnically diverse district that would find
offense with Mr. Wade's work and conclusions in regards to
race, I ask that the letter to the editor signed by more than a
hundred geneticists and biologists opposing the use of their
research in Mr. Wade's book be entered officially into the
record. This speaks to his professional credibility and calls
into question his very presence on this panel.
Dr. Wenstrup. Without objection.
Ms. Tokuda. Thank you. One thing the COVID-19 pandemic made
clear is the need for reliable real-time public health data.
Without it, people of color and the most vulnerable in our
communities are disproportionately impacted. We don't have the
infrastructure to get needed resources to them, and people die.
We, in Congress, must continue to support our Federal
public health agencies, not just in determining the origins of
COVID-19, but in improving data and analytics technology so we
can pinpoint and slow the spread of infectious disease.
At the beginning of the pandemic, we observed difficulty
scaling up the appropriate public health infrastructure to
track and keep pace with COVID-19. This was a catastrophic
wake-up call that we were grossly unprepared to deal with the
pandemic. Coupled with the lack of action, admission, and
leadership by the Trump Administration, people died.
Dr. Auwaerter, let's focus on the facts, and let's put
people first. We need to understand the origins of COVID-19--
there's no argument about that here--to prevent and prepare for
future pandemics. What do public health agencies and
researchers need to do now learning from this pandemic to
ensure that we can quickly test and trace when faced with new
pathogens of pandemic potential?
Dr. Auwaerter. Well, my work as a clinician deals with
public health departments. I'm not a public health department
person, but each state has its own department, and then liaises
with the Centers for Disease Control. And many--I know many of
our state health departments don't have enough funds to
accomplish what they want to. Each state is sort of self-
funding and has other Federal moneys, too. But there's just not
enough resources. There's not enough people. And we have to go
back to work force issues, trainees.
We need to get people excited entering these careers. I'll
mention that for infectious diseases, only 56 percent of our
training programs filled in 2022. There are a number of reasons
for that, including low compensation. I know in public health
officials, clinical laboratories, we have trouble finding
people that want to do that work and getting them into training
programs. So, these are absolutely vital from both clinical
laboratories, public health laboratories. These are sentinel
findings for, you know, trying to see if there's an outbreak,
is there something new impacting the health not only in our
country, but then expand that internationally as well. Because
these same efforts are just as important as keeping peace.
Ms. Tokuda. Thank you. So, clearly the Federal Government
needs to do more in terms of support and resources to support
our state and local public health agencies in order for us to
have a strong infrastructure set up.
Regardless of how the novel coronavirus came to be, it is
important we continue to invest in public health infrastructure
and invest in research on pathogens of pandemic potential with
appropriate guardrails and strict oversight and guidelines. To
do nothing, quite frankly, is to have learned nothing from this
tragedy and set us up for failure and more death in the future.
Dr. Metzl, what would happen if Congress blocked Federal
funding for BSL-3 AND BSL-4 laboratories because of
misinformation and fear-mongering surrounding lab leaks? What
would happen if there a moratorium on gain-of-function
research, which includes developing medical capabilities,
countermeasure and surveillance capacities.
Mr. Metzl. Are you asking me? Are you asking me? I'm sorry?
Ms. Tokuda. Sorry about that. Dr. Auwaerter.
Mr. Metzl. OK.
Dr. Auwaerter. Yes, thank you. So, I think we--you know, if
we have very strict rules and shut down or halt research within
the U.S., there may be others outside our borders carrying this
out. As has already been mentioned that there are countries
that may not participate with standard practices and
agreements. So, this is not an area I labor in, but as a
clinician, and from my infectious diseases perspective within
the society, I think research that does examine these very
carefully, and as you said with guardrails, with oversight, is
important. And, you know, there can be debate about where you
draw the line in terms of doing this research. But I think not
to do it could leave us unprepared. And, of course, there's
different points of view of this. And this has been going back
and forth for a while. But I do think it needs to be vigorously
reexamined.
Ms. Tokuda. Thank you very much. And I know, Dr. Metzl, you
have also concluded these things in your testimony as well, the
support for this research.
Mr. Metzl. Yes. We would be making a grave error if we shut
down virology, if we shut down epidemiology. If we didn't have
high containment virology labs, I think everybody agrees with
that. The only question is, what are the guardrails? And when
we have a situation, such as this, where it appears very likely
that a lab error may have led to this whole pandemic, that
forces us to be very careful and to do the kind of review that
we all need to be working on together.
Ms. Tokuda. Thank you.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Ms. Greene from Georgia for
five minutes of questions.
Ms. Greene. If we're going to look into the origins of
COVID and fully understand where this virus came from, this
virus that has murdered so many people over the world, I think
the most important thing we can do today is look at the
timeline. And if we go back to early 2020 when this was just
starting to kill so many people, we'll see something
interesting. That while Dr. Fauci, Dr. Andersen, Dr. Collins,
Peter Daszak from EcoHealth, who, by the way, had a grant for
gain-of-function research, Dr. Auchincloss and others were
doing everything possible to shut down the Wuhan lab theory,
publicly, even though privately they told each other that
COVID-19 looked engineered and discussed the reason to stop the
theory.
And if they were to, it's really interesting, they wanted
to give reasons for not expressing this opinion to the public
were that it would do great potential harm to science and
international harmony, and do unnecessary harm to science in
general, and science in China, in particular, even though their
paychecks are funded by the American taxpayers.
At the same time this was going on, the CCP was using its
full weight and power to spread a propaganda campaign to
conceal the origins of COVID, numbers of cases and deaths, and
protect their own reputations while stockpiling medical
supplies severely hurting the global supply chain and
definitely hurting America.
In the same way the CCP's silenced, censored and prisoned
dissenters who tried to tell the truth, Dr. Fauci and his
cohorts seemingly were running their own misinformation and,
ultimately, censorship campaign to, in quotes from Dr. Collins
to Dr. Fauci, ``put down this very destructive conspiracy about
the lab leak theory.''
But it's really interesting. I think we should revisit
January 27, 2020. Dr. Anthony Fauci, the Director of the
National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases finds out
that they have a financial relationship with the Wuhan
Institute of Virology through EcoHealth Alliance, and that
they've been working with novel coronaviruses.
January 31, 2020, Dr. Fauci is warned by Dr. Kristian
Andersen that some of COVID-19's features potentially look
engineered and the genome is inconsistent with expectations
from evolutionary theory.
Dr. Redfield, did you agree, in your opinion, with Dr.
Andersen's assessment at the time that this virus did look
engineered?
Dr. Redfield. I was concerned because of the presence of
the furin cleavage site that we've talked about. And I think
it's important to understand what that cleavage site does. That
cleavage site totally changes the orientation of the binding
domain of COVID. So it now, which could not see the H-2
receptor, which is the human receptor, it totally changes the
orientation now so it has high affinity for human receptors.
So, that furin cleavage site bothered me. It didn't seem that
it belonged there.
And then when you look at the sequences that it uses beyond
this committee, but I know many of you have looked into it, the
sequences that they used in those 12 nucleotides for arginine
were the arginine sequences nucleotide triplet coded for the
human arginine? So, why did this virus have the arginine
sequences for human there, not bat? It was very disconcerting
to me. It looked like this virus was engineered.
Ms. Greene. Was this--what you're observing and speaking
of, is this something that would in line with gain-of-function
research and the capabilities it would provide to the----
Dr. Redfield. Right----
Ms. Greene [continuing]. Virus.
Dr. Redfield [continuing]. Yes. I mean, basically this lab
published in 2014 that they accomplished in this--allowing the
coronaviruses that they were working with in the lab to bind to
the H-2 receptor and humanize mice. And the only way they did
that was by reorienting the binding domain.
Ms. Greene. And it was clear to them at this time that that
was likely the issue in their private conversations. Yet, by
February 4, a paper on the origins of COVID is drafted by four
participants of the February 1 conference call. One of those
participants, Dr. Andersen, completely reverses himself in an
email to the President of EcoHealth, Peter Daszak, and says,
``The main crackpot theories going around at the moment relate
to this virus being somehow engineered, and that is
demonstrably false.''
My question to you, Mr. Redfield, did you know of any
evidence that they had found within three days from February 1
to February 4 to be able to confirm that it was not created in
a lab?
Dr. Redfield. As I mentioned earlier, unfortunately, I was
excluded from those conversations, which I found retroactively
very disappointed, since I was, obviously, a virologist and
very engaged. And I actually had asked Jeremy Farrar, Tony
Fauci, and Tedros to have these conversations. And then to be
excluded I found unusual.
I do think it illustrates one point that's worth really
focusing on. When you have a group of people that decide there
could only be one point of view, that's problematic. And I'll
keep going saying it's antithetical to science. And
unfortunately, that's what they did.
Ms. Greene. I can tell you, Dr. Redfield, that is the case.
That's very problematic because how people suffered in this
country from those, what I would call, tyrannical decisions
using their positions of power and shutting down the country in
the way they did.
Dr. Wenstrup. The gentlelady's time has expired.
Ms. Greene. I think people definitely do feel that way.
Thank you. I yield back.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Dr. Jackson from Texas for
five minutes of questions.
Dr. Jackson. Thank you, Mr. Chairman, I appreciate it. I
want to thank all of our witnesses for being here. Dr.
Redfield, I want to thank you, in particular, for your service
as CDC Director. You were key in getting some of the
meatpacking plants back up and running during the height of the
pandemic in my district, and I appreciate that.
I just want to say I agree with a few of the things that
have been said on the other side of the aisle from my
colleagues. And one of the things I want to talk about that
hasn't really been addressed here from this side of the aisle
is that, yes, I do believe that public health has been
devastated by this COVID-19 pandemic. But, that is because
public health officials in this country decided that they were
going to consider the politics surrounding this issue when
making statements and recommendations. That's the root of the
problem with the public health here.
And, yes, this must be repaired. We have to get our public
health industry back. The only way that that will change, the
only way that that will change is if we--and that we can regain
the trust and confidence that we have to have in this country
in our public health sector is to look back at what happened,
who made what decisions, and why those decisions were made.
And, most importantly, if public health authorities, such as
Anthony Fauci, betrayed the trust of the American people, they
must be held accountable. Period. Somebody has to be held
accountable. This is a problem we have in government,
throughout government. If there's no accountability, nothing
changes.
We're going to be doomed to repeat this whole disastrous
period in American history again if we don't get the answers
about what happened and why it happened.
So, in addition, I just want to say that this continues to
this very day. The WHO, China, the mainstream media, social
media, they all need to be called out. They need be to held
accountable for their part in this coverup. Millions of people
died, and we need some answers to what's going on.
And I'll say that we still have an issue with this today.
We still have an issue with corrupt, politically driven advice.
And this is evidenced by the misinformation regarding masks,
natural immunity, the need for boosters, and most importantly
and most important to me at this particular time, the
inappropriate efforts to vaccinate our children.
So, I would just say that we have to regain this trust in
public health, and we have to do it quickly before something
like this comes down the pike again, because the American
people right now have zero trust and confidence in the public
health sector in this country.
So, I want to ask you real quickly, Dr. Metzl and Dr.
Redfield, what do you think that we should and could do to
regain that trust of our public health sector?
Mr. Metzl. A number of things. First, we need to look
objectively, honest, directly, fearlessly at the COVID origins
issue. As I had said before, I think the primary culprit, if
that's the right word, is China. But we also need to look at
ourselves. We really need to look at everything. We need to
follow the evidence. We also need to establish a bipartisan
process for evaluating the entirety of our readiness. And
that's why, in my remarks, I recommended establishing a
bipartisan COVID-19 commission, kind of like being built on the
model of the 9/11 Commission, because it's going to be very
difficult to do it piecemeal. We really need comprehensively,
in a bipartisan manner, to develop an action plan. And because
health is international, that means exactly as you've said, we
need to focus on the national and the international level.
Dr. Jackson. Dr. Redfield, real quickly.
Dr. Redfield. Yes, real quick. I think the first and
foremost is we've got to tell the truth. When you don't tell
the truth, you've got a problem. And I think if you go back,
there were many times when public health officials packaged the
message to what they wanted to say, but it wasn't necessarily
truthful.
The second thing, you have to have the courage when you're
a public health official to say, I don't know, when you don't
know. And I think the really fundamental--that's how we begin
to lose it when people say that we're going to be OK once we
get 30 percent immunity, and then later they say 50 percent,
and then later they say 70 percent. And then the press says,
well, why did you say 50 percent before, and now you're saying
70 percent? And the guy says, well, I didn't think the public
was ready to hear that.
Dr. Jackson. Thank you, sir.
Dr. Redfield. You've got to tell the truth.
Dr. Jackson. I want to get a little bit of time here. I
want to say, I did agree with some of the stuff that was being
said on the opposite side of the aisle. One of the things I
don't agree with, and I think that the way we have to fix this
is we do have to get past the politics now. It's over, and it's
done with. There's been a lot of damage done. We've got to get
past that.
And I'm disturbed that, you know, the people on the left in
this committee can't talk about this at all without bringing up
Trump, racism, or conspiracy theorists. And I just want to
make--clear the record on one particular thing, President Trump
on May 29, 2020, recognizing the failures of WHO, severed the
U.S. relationship with WHO citing the need for serious reforms.
And despite no reforms taking place, on his first day in
office, President Biden rejoined the WHO, which was and
continues to be nothing more than a puppet of the Chinese
Government.
I want to also say that on January 31, 2020, President
Trump came under intense criticism when he banned travel from
China, an order then-Presidential candidate Biden called
xenophobic. A move that even the highly respected Dr. Fauci on
the other side of the aisle praised as saying that Trump's
actions saved thousands and millions of lives. So, thank you.
With that, I yield back.
Dr. Wenstrup. I now recognize Mr. Jordan from Ohio for five
minutes.
Mr. Jordan. I thank the Chairman. Look forward, the
Democrats tell us. Focus on the future. It might have started
in a lab. It might have happened in nature. But here is the
question I keep coming up with. If it may have been a lab, it
may have been nature we're supposed to look forward, then why
did Dr. Fauci work so hard for just one of those theories? Why
was it so important to push one over the other?
Dr. Bera said, Oh, we should entertain all hypotheses. Dr.
Fauci had his hypothesis, how this started. We should entertain
all of them. But that's not what happened. That is definitely
not what happened.
Three years ago, if you thought it came from a lab, if you
raised that, you were called a nutjob, you got censored on
Twitter, you were blacklisted on Twitter. You were even called
a crackpot by the very scientists who, in late January, sent
emails to Dr. Fauci and said it came from a lab. They called
you crackpot. Is that right, Dr. Redfield?
Dr. Redfield. I think the most upsetting thing to me was
The Baltimore Sun calling me a racist because I said this came
from a Wuhan lab.
Mr. Jordan. Dr. Redfield, you ran the CDC, and you were on
the coronavirus task force. Is that right?
Dr. Redfield. Correct.
Mr. Jordan. That was formed on January 29, 2020. Is that
right?
Dr. Redfield. Correct.
Mr. Jordan. Two days later, Dr. Fauci gets an email from
Dr. Andersen which says what? Virus looks engineered. Virus not
consistent with evolutionary theory. Is that accurate?
Dr. Redfield. That's my understanding if you want to----
Mr. Jordan. Yes, I know. Did he share that email with you,
by the way, Dr. Redfield?
Dr. Redfield. No.
Mr. Jordan. As a member of the task force, as the head of
CDC, did he share that email with you?
Dr. Redfield. No.
Mr. Jordan. OK. Next day, February 1, Dr. Garry sends Dr.
Fauci another email. That email says: I don't know how this
happens in nature, but it would be easy to do in a lab. Did he
share that email with you, Dr. Redfield?
Dr. Redfield. No, no.
Mr. Jordan. You didn't see either one of those emails, even
though you're head of CDC, even though you're on the
coronavirus task force that had been formed just two days,
three days earlier.
Dr. Redfield. No.
Mr. Jordan. Three days later, Dr. Andersen and Dr. Garry
who told us it came from a lab in emails to Dr. Fauci that Dr.
Fauci wouldn't let Dr. Redfield see, three days later they
changed their position 180 degrees. The question is why?
Mr. Wade, why would they change their position that fast
when the only intervening event is a conference call with Dr.
Fauci, the guy who wouldn't let Dr. Redfield see the very
emails that they had sent him, Dr. Redfield head of CDC on the
coronavirus task force, why would they change their position,
Dr. Wade--or Mr. Wade?
Mr. Wade. Well, this question does lie at the heart of the
issue. What is pertinent seems to me is there's no new
scientific evidence that we can see that became available
between these dates of Jan 31st and Feb 4.
Mr. Jordan. Right, there's no new--I think you're--go
ahead.
Mr. Wade. So, you have to ask if there were other kinds of
influence available. Now it is true that Dr. Fauci and Dr.
Farrar in London were very powerful research officials and
between them they controlled----
Mr. Jordan. I read your testimony. I saw that.
Mr. Wade. OK.
Mr. Jordan. Yes.
Mr. Wade. So----
Mr. Jordan. Why don't you cut to the chase and tell them
what you really think was the reason.
Mr. Wade. I don't know what the reason was. I just----
Mr. Jordan. I know what it was.
Mr. Wade. Go ahead, sir.
Mr. Jordan. No, go ahead. Go ahead. I'll let you say it,
because I read your testimony. I think you said it in your
testimony, too. Maybe you're reluctant to say it here, but go
ahead.
Mr. Wade. Well, if you're looking at the timeline on May
21, just a few weeks after the the Nature Medicine article had
come out, two of the signatures of the original email to Dr.
Fauci, that's Dr. Andersen and Dr. Garry, were awarded a $9
million grant.
Mr. Jordan. So, there's 9 million reasons why they changed
their mind. I knew you would get to it. I read that last night.
So, three days after they say it came from a lab, they changed
their position. And the only intervening event, the conference
call with Dr. Fauci and Dr. Collins, again, a call that Mr.
Redfield was not allowed to be on, the head of CDC and on the
coronavirus task force. And then three months later, shazam.
They get nine million bucks from Dr. Fauci.
Well, isn't that something? Isn't that something? That's
why we want to talk to these guys. That's why Chairman Wenstrup
wants to bring in Dr. Andersen and Dr. Garry and ask them a
series of questions so we can get to the bottom of this, so we
can move forward and deal with this.
Here is the key question. I'm just a commonsense guy from
Ohio. Well, I majored in wrestling in college. I got a degree
in economics. You're supposed to get a degree when you go to
college. I got one in economics. And one of the things they
tell you about is a thing called opportunity cost. So, when
you're spending your time making sure that the country believes
only one of these theories, you could have been doing what Dr.
Redfield was doing in our government, trying to figure out how
we deal with this virus. And what was Dr. Fauci doing? He was
trying to cover his backside and everybody knows it. And that's
the part that ticks us off, because this is the highest paid
guy in our government, getting all kinds of money to tell us
things that were not accurate. Because we now know U.S. tax
dollars went to a lab in China, a lab that was not up to code,
a lab that was doing gain-of-function research, and that's
where this thing most definitely came from. And Dr. Fauci had
to prove no, no, he can't have that news getting out. And
that's why he did what he did to the exclusion of a brilliant
guy running our CDC; kept him out of the loop. Keeping him out
of the loop, probably potentially could have harmed America.
That's the thing that ticks us all off.
And that's why, Mr. Chairman, this hearing is so darn
important that we get to the bottom of really what happened. I
yield back.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you. At this point, I'm going to make a
closing statement before--yes, you will follow me, and then I
will yield to you for a closing statement.
You know, this is very serious business, extremely serious
business, apolitical serious business. And I believe that Dr.
Ruiz, the ranking member on the subcommittee feels exactly the
same way. You know, there's a difference between saying I
disagree with you and here's why, as opposed to labeling
something a conspiracy theory, or someone a conspiracy
theorist. There's a huge difference. That's the politics that
comes in. We need to get it out. No more. For this committee,
and as a general discussion across America, I hope that that
can change.
I'm first a physician. I'm also a soldier, Iraq War
veteran. I've served on the Intelligence Committee here for the
last 10 years. I've had a security clearance since 1998 as a
soldier.
This subcommittee is about an after-action review, lessons
learned through this process, finding truths, and building a
path forward so that we can have readiness in the future.
That's what we need to do.
My life has been about trying to improve other lives to
keep people healthy and also about the security of the United
States of America. I'd love for this thing to be from nature. I
would love that. Because that would be better for all of us.
But I can't help but look at this and say, there's another
possibility here. And when I think of that other possibility,
it leads my mind with my experience in life to so many
nefarious things that can happen to us as a people. This is a
national security issue. This is a national health issue.
Some things might start out as good. I don't think the
Wright brothers ever intended for planes to be flown into
buildings to kill thousands of people. That may be the case. We
need to consider all those possibilities, the lessons learned.
I can give you some lessons learned. You know, we're talking
about trust and building trust. And I will tell you, going back
to Secretary Azar, I made the suggestion, America needs to hear
from doctors that are treating COVID patients. I think that
would be the most helpful. That's who they know. That's who
they trust. Those are the people in the trenches, not from
politicians, and not from someone who's never at bedside who's
just in the lab.
The origins of this is important. Because when we talk to
doctors who are treating patients, for example, though, this is
where I think early on it was most important, because all they
were concerned about, and all Americans were concerned about is
whether they were going to live or die. And will you come up
with a cure or a vaccine? That's all they worried about. But as
we try to move forward, the origins of this is important, so
that we don't have to struggle in the same way that we did
through all of this. And trust is important.
Dr. Redfield, I agree with you on the declassification.
Hopefully, we will get there. It's important for transparency,
for sunlight on all of this. Obviously, there's methods and
other things we have to keep out. I get that. And you'd
commented on another thing that I had written down before you
said it, because to me it's important as a doctor to be honest
about what we don't know. And when we don't know something, and
we hypothesize something, and then we find out we're wrong we
have to say we didn't know, and now we know better. That didn't
happen.
And I'll give you an example. You know, early on, people
were saying, well, in the summer, it may dissipate like other
coronaviruses have in the summer. That made sense, but it
didn't happen. And we should have said, oh my gosh, that didn't
happen. This thing isn't called novel for a reason, and we need
to do a little more digging.
I am open to various opinions, especially from experts in
the arena, including doctors that are treating affected
patients. That's where we have to go. This committee is going
to deal with all aspects of the pandemic, but this is one
that's very important and on the minds of every American.
I want to thank you all for your testimonies today, for
taking the time to be with us. We may have to see you again,
we'll see. But at the same time, I do want to thank all of you
for being here. And with that, I will turn it over to the
ranking member for his final comments. Thank you.
Dr. Ruiz. I, too, want to thank all the witnesses for
coming today and testifying before this committee.
Let me be clear, my Democratic colleagues and I take
seriously the charge of determining the coronavirus' origins.
And that is why we must allow scientists and intelligence
experts to do their research without politicizations, or
politicians politicizing the issue using extreme partisan
rhetoric or making conclusions or accusations without concrete
evidence. It seems like minds on the other side of the aisle
are shut and made up on the origins, and they have chosen their
villain.
If we truly want to follow the evidence, the truth is that
the evidence as we have it now is inconclusive. But
villainizing our public health experts through conspiratorial
accusations based on partisan suspicions and not concrete
evidence does nothing to help us prevent and prepare for future
pandemics.
I, too, am a physician. I, too, have taken care of patients
who have died due to dyspnea; in other words, they couldn't
breath; they didn't get the oxygen. And I have intubated and
kept people alive and resuscitated people over and over in the
emergency department. These are not political ideas for the
individual who's diabetic and lives in a poor neighborhood that
doesn't have access to testing or to healthcare access.
This is not political. They don't give two cents of who
knew what and by when. They want to make sure that they stay
alive, that they can get the medicines, that they can live in a
country that doesn't have to politicize every single damn
thing. And they want to see their government work for them, for
the people, to do the right thing.
And I do agree that we need to evaluate the evidence as it
comes, just like when we had the lack of evidence of this novel
virus, and we made, as Dr. Redfield and Dr. Auwaerter said,
some conservative decisions in order to protect until we knew
more, until we were able to have the resources to put shots in
arms, students responsibly back into schools, people
responsibly back into work.
But villainizing our public health experts undermines our
efforts to do so. You see it hurts the recruitment of public
health servants in a time when we have a public health servant
shortage. And it hurts trust. It hurts trust in basic public
health measures like masks that reduces airborne transmission
and vaccines that save lives.
Congress has an important role in supporting the expert
community's efforts to get to the bottom of the coronavirus'
origins. We also have an important role to be forward looking
in developing the policy solutions necessary to mitigate the
threat of new viruses, no matter where they came from.
You know, I saw each of the witnesses nod in agreement in
my discussion with Dr. Auwaerter regarding constructive policy
solutions like raising the international standards for pathogen
research.
There is still an opportunity for us to correct course. And
this is a message on both sides of the aisle for this select
subcommittee to be a constructive body that focuses on forward
looking solutions; ones that save lives that matter to
individuals who are at risk of dying today from this virus.
So, let's debate gain-of-function research. Let's discuss
what we can do to improve safety guidelines and transparency in
foreign labs. Let's discuss how to increase trust in basic
public health measures to save lives and recruit more public
health workers. Let's put people above politics. We owe it to
the American people to take every action we can to save lives.
And I stand ready to work with the Chairman to do so.
Dr. Wenstrup. Thank you, Dr. Ruiz. In closing, I would like
to thank our panelists once again for their important and
insightful testimony today. With that and without objection,
all members will have five legislative days within which to
submit materials and to submit additional written questions for
the witnesses which will be forwarded to the witnesses for
their response.
If there's no further business, without objection, the
select subcommittee stands adjourned. Thank you.
[Whereupon, at 11:50 a.m., the subcommittee was adjourned.]
[all]