China hindering Covid origins probe: Biden
President Joe Biden rebuked China for stonewalling a US investigation into the origins of the coronavirus, as his administration reported it was unable to reach firm conclusions because of Beijing’s unwillingness to cooperate. China denied that it had hindered the probe.
“To this day, the PRC (the People’s Republic of China) continues to reject calls for transparency and withhold information, even as the toll of this pandemic continues to rise,” Biden said in a statement. “We must have a full and transparent accounting of this global tragedy. Nothing less is acceptable.”
US intelligence has ruled out that the coronavirus was developed as a weapon, and most agencies assess with “low confidence” it was not genetically engineered.
But the community remains divided on the pathogen’s origins, with four agencies and the National Intelligence Council judging in favour of natural exposure to an animal as the likely explanation, and one agency favouring the lab leak theory. Analysts at three agencies were unable to reach a conclusion. “After examining all available intelligence reporting and other information … the intelligence community remains divided on the most likely origins of Covid-19,” the office of the director of national intelligence said in a short two-page summary of their findings.
“All agencies assess that two hypotheses are plausible: natural exposure to an infected animal and a laboratory-associated incident,” it added.
“Variations in analytic views
largely stem from differences in how agencies weigh intelligence reporting and scientific publications, and intelligence and scientific gaps,” the summary said.
The intelligence community and global scientists lack clinical
samples or epidemiological data from the earliest Covid-19 cases, it added.
Biden said the US would continue to work with allies to press Beijing to share more information and cooperate with the
World Health Organization.
China’s embassy in Washington on Friday accused the US intelligence community of “political manipulation” after the report was released. “The report by the US intelligence community shows that the US is bent on going down the wrong path of political manipulation,” the embassy said.
Delta variant doubles risk of hospitalisation
People who contract the Delta variant of Covid-19 are more than twice as likely to be hospitalised as those infected with the Alpha strain, according to a UK study, raising the prospect of a greater burden on health services this winter.
The review of more than 43,000 Covid-19 cases in England, most of whom were unvaccinated or partially vaccinated, was published in The Lancet Infectious Diseases journal on Friday. It highlighted the protection shots provide against hospitalisation from both variants.