{"id":69166,"date":"2021-03-27T06:50:57","date_gmt":"2021-03-27T13:50:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/truedy.com\/?p=69166"},"modified":"2021-03-30T23:35:44","modified_gmt":"2021-03-31T06:35:44","slug":"69166","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/truedy.com\/?p=69166","title":{"rendered":"Ex-CDC Director Robert Redfield believes COVID-19 came from Wuhan lab"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

The former director of the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention believes the virus that causes COVID-19 escaped from a lab<\/a> in Wuhan, China, according to a new interview.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Robert Redfield told CNN on Friday<\/a> that it was his \u201copinion\u201d that SARS-CoV-2 \u2014 the new coronavirus responsible for killing 2.7 million people globally \u2014 did not evolve naturally.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI\u2019m of the point of view that I still think the most likely etiology of this pathology in Wuhan was from a laboratory \u2014 escaped,\u201d said Redfield, who led the CDC during the height of the pandemic. \u201cOther people don\u2019t believe that. That\u2019s fine. Science will eventually figure it out.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Researchers believe the deadly and highly transmissible strain of coronavirus behind the global pandemic mutated from a virus that infects animals \u2014 namely, bats \u2014 to one that sickens humans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But some believe the virus was somehow released from the Wuhan Institute of Virology \u2014 which is the only lab in China authorized to study the most dangerous known pathogens, according to Axios<\/a>.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not unusual for respiratory pathogens that are being worked on in a laboratory to infect the laboratory worker. \u2026 That\u2019s not implying any intentionality,\u201d Redfield said. \u201cIt\u2019s my opinion, right? But I am a virologist. I have spent my life in virology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI do not believe this somehow came from a bat to a human and at that moment in time, that the virus came to the human, became one of the most infectious viruses that we know in humanity for human-to-human transmission.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

Redfield said usually when a virus jumps from animals to humans, \u201cit takes a while for it to figure out how to become more and more efficient in human-to-human transmission.\u201d<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not unusual for respiratory pathogens that are being worked on in a laboratory to infect the laboratory worker. \u2026 That\u2019s not implying any intentionality,\u201d Redfield said. \u201cIt\u2019s my opinion, right? But I am a virologist. I have spent my life in virology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

One year into the pandemic, multiple variants of COVID-19 keep cropping up<\/a>, including some that have shown to be more transmissible than others.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

\u201cI just don\u2019t think this makes biological sense,\u201d Redfield added.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

SARS-CoV-2 was first detected in Wuhan in December 2019 \u2014 with many scientists believing it emerged at a wet market just under nine miles from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

But Redfield said he believes the bug was circulating as early as September or October of that year.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

 A probe by the World Health Organization concluded recently that it was \u201cextremely unlikely\u201d<\/a> that the virus stemmed from a lab accident \u2014 and that it likely originated in animals before it spread to humans.<\/p>\n\n\n\n