Report: Wuhan lab staffers had Covid-like illness in ’19
China trashes claim as untrue, accuses US of hyping up theory that the virus leaked from the laboratory
WASHINGTON/BEIJING: Three researchers from China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) sought hospital care in November 2019, a month before China reported the first cases of Covid-19, the Wall Street Journal reported on Sunday, citing a US intelligence report.
The newspaper said the previously undisclosed report - which provides fresh details on the number of researchers affected, the timing of their illnesses, and their hospital visits - may add weight to calls for a broader investigation into whether the Covid-19 virus could have escaped from the laboratory.
The news report said current and former officials familiar with the intelligence expressed a range of views about the strength of the report’s supporting evidence, with one unnamed person saying it needed “further investigation and additional corroboration”.
The first cases of what would eventually be known as Covid-19 were reported at the end of December 2019 in the central Chinese city of Wuhan, where the advanced laboratory specialising in coronavirus research is located.
After the news broke, China flatly accused the US of hyping up the theory that the coronavirus escaped from the Wuhan lab. “The report that you mentioned about three people getting sick, that is not true,” Chinese foreign ministry spokesperson Zhao Lijian told reporters on Monday in Beijing when asked to comment on the WSJ report.
Saying the report was “completely untrue”, Zhao said, “The United States continues to hype up the lab leak theory.”
“Does it care about traceability or is it just trying to distract attention?” he questioned.
Yuan Zhiming, director of the Wuhan lab, told Chinese state media that the report was incorrect. “I’ve read it, it’s a complete lie,” Yuan told Global Times on Monday about the WSJ report, which was published on Sunday headlined “Intelligence on sick staff at Wuhan lab fuels debate on Covid-19 origin”.
“Those claims are groundless. The lab has not been aware of this situation (that researchers had fallen sick in autumn 2019), and I don’t even know where such information came from,” Yuan said.
Asked about the report, World
Health Organization (WHO) spokesman Tarik Jasarevic said via email that the world body’s technical teams were now deciding on the next steps. He said further study was needed into the role of animal markets as well as the laboratory leak hypothesis.
A US national security council spokeswoman had no comment on the report, but said the US continued to have “serious questions about the earliest days of the Covid-19 pandemic, including its origins within China”.