CIA believes the COVID-19 pandemic was the result of an accidental lab leak in China, per assessment just declassified by Trump's new CIA Director John Ratcliffe. Note: the assessment was started under the Biden administration
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The leak may have occurred when Trump abruptly withdrew American researchers from the lab some months earlier. If there was espionage why rule out U.S.?
What's suspicious is hiding the main vector for contagion to the West: returning athletes from the World Military Olympics held there in the fall.
Well, here it's an accident. So any research on a pathogen can be the source of accidental escape from a lab. Not a bioweapon since they got it first. They're just picking a favorite hypothesis from a set of things we still aren't sure about.
What I love is that if it genuinely was a Chinese bio-weapon, that means that right wingers actively helped the Chinese government devastate the country by refusing to take any cautionary measures to limit the spread of said weapon. Their own arguments make them look worse.
I am not sure why people can’t just live with uncertainty on this. Different federal agencies have come to different conclusions. Lab leak is a likely answer. So is an animal to human transmission chain. Both things could be causes of future pandemics and should be prevented.
They figured out a thing other scientists still aren't sure of? Well, one thing is true--we can always trust the CIA. Maybe the CIA can take over the NIH and keep doing all the medical research.
Yeah the Chinese really gained ground with their “accidental” release. Is that what we are going with. Ok CIA now tell us the next logical thing..what did China gain from letting it out as you seem to be suggesting?
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Ego. They can't admit the other side was right about something. I had my suspicions about the source but still masked and got vaccinated bc I'm not an idiot.
Honestly, I remember a news article about some lab explosion in China from like Oct or Nov of 19, then a bit later one about some virus making people attack each other. I always wish I wouldve gotten SS, but I didn't think much of it. Then in late Dec/Jan Covid was announced and I've always wondered
I remember that too. But at that time I fell ill from a very severe cold that turned into a fever. Didn't think anything of it then either until they started talking about symptoms of this thing from China. And I remember thinking wait did I get that thing before it was said to have spread?
There are other versions of Covid prior to 19. So there's a chance you got an earlier mutation. The one that hit widespread had just mutated enough (or came out mutated idk) that almost no one had immunity to it. Lysol cans said they kill covid prior to 2019. That's why it's 19, there's 18 others
At this point who cares how it was started, we are still dealing with it due to mismanagement from the Trump and Biden admin. Now, there's a good chance we will have to worry about bird flu as well.
This is U.S. state propaganda. CIA director John Radcliffe is strategically declassifying it because he knows the public won’t read past the headlines and will just be primed to accept upcoming anti-China policies.
NIH research supports that Covid-19 likely has a zoonotic (animal-to-human) origin.
This isn't even a new story. There's articles about this from at least a year ago.
A survey of CIA agents concluded that they had low confidence that that was the cause. Journos (you, ken) are supposed to interpret that and tell the public, but instead, they told everyone that it was a lab leak.
When the Traitor Twats start pointing fingers again, remind them that the cause is one thing - how you handle the response is the MOST important thing.
It cannot be an excuse for the horrendous failures
Just imagine if either of us had ignored our critical duty while operational for 187 seconds let alone Trump's 187 minutes as the Capitol was being assaulted?
Could easily end up way past mast
Tell any Trump voting vet - Robert E Lee became a vet the second he turned traitor. Disgusting fucks.
All those early pandemic absolutely documented cover ups… this is very likely. If you want to go full schizo there seems to be reasons to believe it was gain of function research. It’s just genetically too far away from natural coronaviruses
Yeah some samples that had to be tested were destroyed if I remember correctly, some database taken offline, refused to test, admit it was human transmitted and airborne, shut down WHO investigators
So the coverup aspect bolsters that it came from the wet market, along with the direct epidemiological evidence that suggests it spread from the wet market.
No, there was coronavirus detected in Italy in like September 2019. Patient 0 absolutely didn’t come from the market that was just one of the early outbreaks. The thinking is employees at the lab got it and leaked it to the world
Keep in mind that Trump repealed an Obama era restriction on gain of function research, meaning that he might have caused COVID because he hates Obama that much.
I think that's actually likely. China stonewalled investigators for weeks, and I'm sure they'd do whatever it took to avoid the entire world pointing the finger at them for grinding humanity to a halt
Without proper cooperation from china theres never going to be fully provable cause. But the occum’s razor explanation has been lab leak for a while now.
This is just more evidence that their intel backs that theory.
Natural zoonotic disease is the most parsimonious answer for the disease's presence. That would make it, not the lab leak hypothesis, favored by Occam's Razor.
Okay. Im willing to concede that. I had not looked into the lab leak beyond hearing reports saying it was believed likely. Any source that gives more info on that which explains it well?
To expand on this, the CIA trades on rumors and such, which isn’t nothing. But the actual direct evidence, things that are observable and measurable show that the epidemic centered on the wet market.
Maybe you went into a cave, picked a random bat, and brought it into the Huanan seafood market because you were trying to get people sick.
The evidence shows that the market was the early epicenter of the pandemic, after all. Every possibility is equally as likely based on that information.
There is no evidence or else they would release some of it. This is intended to get ppl mad at China so they can eventually manipulate their way into war. The same thing happened before the gulf war & also in the lead up to the invasion of Iraq in 2003
You can start with common sense and go from there.
They tried to supress this theory on the beginning. Why suppress the thing they wanted to be the main public opinion? https://youtu.be/v_IEC-0Yj6w?si=r7zSJQJjsYFiY7tQ
Jon Stewart joking about it is not evidence of anything. If they had evidence they'd report on it. They've got a fascist in the Whitehouse & they are trying to get the public on board for eventual war with China. Simple as.
I don’t support war with China. I just don’t think this is about that. Im sure it would coincide with it. I think they just want to release this info to get credit for releasing stuff even though it doesn’t really change anything.
I don't understand how that changes anything. Regardless how it started, it spread across the country and killed far more people than it might have had more people did the bare minimum to limit the spread of the virus.
Note: They have no new intelligence, this is a political finding made with low confidence, and the science all still points to the market as the source
And 2 days after Trump's yes man was appointed to CIA. And NIH is prohibited from saying anything. The CIA is now controlled by Trump along with MM just like Putin did when he came to power. Its one huge propoganda machine that he will weaponize to stay in power until he dies.
it was the BL2 2 blocks from the wet market. they studied batts. Someone took a cage out the back door and sold them for a couple bucks. That cage got put on top of the wrong pangolin.
Can you confirm the confidence level? I've only seen it mentioned once, putting it at "low," which would make this simply a change in policy (Gee, wonder why) rather than anything tangible.
Trump caused it to spread throughout the United States and then to Europe.
Then he bought stock in untested pharmaceuticals and tried to seek them to dying people from the White House.
Trump and his stupidity and ineptitude are what spread COVID19 and nothing else.
This comes 2 days after the new Republican CIA director was confirmed, from a Republican-led panel. Big whoop. The republicans can say anything they want to for the next 2 years & wont be held accountable for legitimacy because of their majority in each branch of government.
Whether it was a lab leak, organic, or intentional authoritarians used for the same thing and I’m not talking about masking and distancing, that’s good. I’m talking looting our money, “my employer” for example got millions tax free in misused PPP andI can’t get $1 of ui untaxed for the same event.
No, but this did come out under Biden, or at least leaks happened related to the story. True or not true I can't comment on as far as the story itself, but the CIA did say this some time in 2023 iirc.
I'd have to poke around and heading out the door now, but it was reported by several MSM organizations awhile ago. I remember the reports, but not the details now.
What has the CIA got to do with health related expertise? If their confidence in the assessment is low, why make a confident announcement, unless it’s just the new boss ‘bending the knee’?
The spokesperson added that the agency has “low confidence in this judgement” and will continue to evaluate any new intelligence reporting or relevant information.
Obama ended “Gain of Function” in 2014 but Fauci pivoted to outsourcing that research. It seems that is no coincidence that Fauci’s pardon goes back to 2014. Fauci is no hero.
In its very own report, the CIA said they have "low confidence" in this finding. They were pushed to make an assessment, but they still say they really don't know. This was just meant to give a layup to the MAGA base who loved calling it the Wuhan virus.
Yeah makes sense. I figure most people assumed something like this anyway, I did. I guess they’re just trying to take credit for “solving” it even though they also wanted to act like it’s a hoax?
Yeah, they were told by the CIA director to make a "final report" - but there is no new intel or anything. The "low confidence"is very telling and is (annoyingly) missing from all the headlines.
Who cares how it started when the US govt, businesses and gen public decided to minimize it, and act like it's gone when it's still a top killer in the US and harms ongoing health for those who survive.
That’s what I never understood. Why spend so much time, money, and energy trying to figure out the origin? It doesn’t change the horrific outcomes or current threat.
Figuring out origin is important for future study of any virus and how it may spread. Lab manipulated vs animal origin. Potential concerns over mutations and such. Can the very process of finding origin be manipulated? Sure. More for political reasons, though.
By “origin” I did not mean how it came to be. I meant whether it was an accidental lab leak or purposely used as a bioweapon by China, which is what the right keeps claiming, as if it somehow excuses the US’s disastrous response to it.
Sure, but HOW it became infectious in a lab if it did leak from one- was it manipulated for study or was it a natural pathogen isolated from samples in their database.
For me, knowing it was from a lab would change the epidemiology. I'm not a doctor and spaced out through a lot of biology class, but I did watch a lot of House, and he always seemed obsessed with the root cause, so I'll roll with that.
It's a very clever bit. Also plays into what Vivek said about Americans being too busy watching friends- or something like that- to actually competwoth foriegn workers.
I found the link that pointed to the CIA whistleblower from 2023. Whether you believe the whistleblower or not is another question, but this wasn't a Trump thing - it was an internal CIA thing from well into the Biden presidency.
No like do you actually think that HouseMD is a reasonable way to diagnose things? Furthermore do you think that House finds the source for tuberculosis before diagnosing it?
And now we are on track to a repeat with the bird flu which will be worse now that the CDC and others are being silenced and defunded. Deja vu, anyone? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdIzcRvpAFE
Even if it was, is it China's fault that our response was so dogshit and let a million die because we wanted to "keep the economy open"? It just shows how weak America is that it can't defend itself lest it deprive itself of treats
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What's suspicious is hiding the main vector for contagion to the West: returning athletes from the World Military Olympics held there in the fall.
However, I’m sure he has enough macho fortitude to smooch a chicken.
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I'm not sure why people in the comments feel so strongly about where the virus originated.
The lab leak hypnosis is not partisan. It's just likely what happened.
What is going on in the liberal mind?
I think this information is entirely useless.
This is like saying "Based on what I know which is basically nothing, it is possible and there for maybe it is"
NIH research supports that Covid-19 likely has a zoonotic (animal-to-human) origin.
A survey of CIA agents concluded that they had low confidence that that was the cause. Journos (you, ken) are supposed to interpret that and tell the public, but instead, they told everyone that it was a lab leak.
It cannot be an excuse for the horrendous failures
Could easily end up way past mast
Tell any Trump voting vet - Robert E Lee became a vet the second he turned traitor. Disgusting fucks.
This is just more evidence that their intel backs that theory.
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(It’s empty)
The evidence shows that the market was the early epicenter of the pandemic, after all. Every possibility is equally as likely based on that information.
They tried to supress this theory on the beginning. Why suppress the thing they wanted to be the main public opinion?
https://youtu.be/v_IEC-0Yj6w?si=r7zSJQJjsYFiY7tQ
I, for one, believe them.
Then he bought stock in untested pharmaceuticals and tried to seek them to dying people from the White House.
Trump and his stupidity and ineptitude are what spread COVID19 and nothing else.
If only we had a watchdog group for outbreaks.
The link to the article and full report are here:
https://thehill.com/policy/healthcare/5017696-house-oversight-covid-committee-report-read/
The FBI isn't any more honest under a D than under an R either.
The spokesperson added that the agency has “low confidence in this judgement” and will continue to evaluate any new intelligence reporting or relevant information.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdIzcRvpAFE
Seems important to state, yes?
😎
The CIA also warned Trump in November of 2019 that a potential pandemic was in Wuhan and he ignored the intelligence.
https://chatgpt.com/c/679535be-b9fc-8008-a093-45e3070584f2