A new scientific report on the origins of COVID-19 has renewed debate on exactly what caused the deadliest event of the 21st century. It is the latest in a string of academic papers by a small group of elite scientists arguing that the pandemic was the result of a “natural spillover” event. And like each of its predecessors, the report’s underlying data and conclusions are quickly being debunked by more objective scientists.
However, the purpose of the report was likely not to convince but to distract; a ruse to throw off the scent. It was necessary because a growing body of experts and everyday Americans are increasingly convinced by the growing body of evidence that the COVID-19 pandemic was not the product of a natural spillover event but a lab leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
Arguing over the possibility of a natural spillover also distracts from another important question : What part did the U.S. government play in obscuring the origin of the virus?
We have more answers today, thanks to a bipartisan commission organized by the Heritage Foundation, which released a damning report last summer quantifying the full cost of the pandemic. Not only did the pandemic kill over 28 million people worldwide and 1.1 million Americans, it cost the U.S. economy alone $18 trillion in terms of “excess deaths,” income lost, chronic conditions like Long COVID, mental health costs, and education losses.
Arguably the Commission’s most infuriating conclusion was that the pandemic was entirely preventable. Had the Chinese government not engaged in a “systemic cover up” at the outset, millions of lives and trillions of dollars could have been spared.
Perhaps equally enraging, it’s increasingly apparent that various arms of the U.S. government went to great lengths to obscure the origins of COVID-19, and there are growing signs that U.S. intelligence agencies were complicit in this deception.
The Lab Leak
The Commission of senior Republican and Democratic dignitaries was primarily concerned with assessing the cost of the pandemic, China’s culpability, and the policy options available to the U.S. to hold Beijing accountable.
However, against the backdrop of this work, the debate over the pandemic’s origins was reigniting. The early scientific “consensus” that insisted the pandemic was the product of a natural spillover event while the lab leak hypothesis was a “conspiracy theory” was beginning to crumble.
Notably, all nine Commissioners concluded, without dissent, that the pandemic was most likely the result of a research-related incident or “lab leak” in Wuhan, not the product of a natural spillover event. The Commission report concluded that despite four years of extensive hypothesis testing, today “there is no evidentiary basis” for the theory of natural spillover.
A growing number of mainstream scientists have also begun to acknowledge that a lab leak is the more likely of the two hypotheses. Early efforts to stifle debate and discredit the lab-leak theory are increasingly regarded as scientific malpractice at best, and intentional deception at worst.
Speaking of deception, one of the many peculiar twists of the COVID-origins debate has always been the oddly inconclusive assessments of America’s numerous intelligence agencies. Years later, many of these agencies have still offered no assessment at all or a “low confidence” assessment that it was a natural spillover event, even as the evidence implicating a lab leak has grown stronger with time. (The FBI is the only intelligence agency to offer a “medium confidence” assessment in either theory: it believes COVID-19 was the result of a lab leak. The Department of Energy later concurred, although they remain in a minority).
There has been rampant speculation that intelligence community’s aversion to acknowledging the likelihood of a lab leak was politically motivated in a media environment where the natural spillover theory was synonymous with “science” and the lab leak was synonymous with “Trump conspiracy.” Those concerns were further fueled by whistleblower reports suggesting Dr. Anthony Fauci leaned on U.S. government agencies to conclude a lab leak was unlikely. One whistleblower claimed Fauci’s “opinion substantially altered the conclusions that were subsequently drawn.”
Ratcliffe Raises a Flag
The disconnect between these intelligence assessments and the growing probability of a lab leak was brought into sharper focus in 2023, when former Director of National Intelligence (DNI) John Ratcliffe publicly declared that “a lab leak is the only explanation credibly supported by our intelligence, by science and by common sense.” This seemed to be at odds with the public posture of several intelligence agencies.
Ironically, Ratcliffe also served as the chairman of the Heritage commission. At the event unveiling its report in July, he broke some surprising news: He recalled that one week before assuming the position of DNI in May 2020, the intelligence community released a statement backing the "scientific consensus" that SARS-CoV-2 was "naturally occurring."
Once in office, Ratcliffe requested to see the underlying intelligence supporting that assessment. Upon review, he was surprised to find “the vast preponderance of [the intelligence] said exactly opposite...[it] pointed toward this being a research-related incident, not naturally occurring."
Furthermore, during the event Ratcliffe was asked why the world’s premier intelligence agencies were still incapable of making credible assessments on COVID’s origins. His response was concerning:
The notion that some four and a half years later, [the CIA] is not capable of making an assessment [on COVID’s origins] with some degree of confidence...reflects that there are political considerations, financial considerations, that have prevented that. But that's not a good reason not to be honest and forthright with the American people and with the rest of the world.
To recap, the former head of all U.S. intelligence agencies—a former U.S. Attorney and Congressman—is publicly claiming that a) the preponderance of available intelligence has always pointed toward a lab leak even as the intelligence community communicated the exact opposite to the public, and b) the CIA and other intelligence agencies have not provided an honest assessment on COVID-19’s origins due to “political and financial considerations.”
Even in the DC swamp, that’s pretty shocking. Yet rather than causing alarm, Ratcliffe’s claim has been almost entirely ignored by the media.
Conclusion
Most Americans have likely never heard about Ratcliffe’s surprising revelations, or the Commission report, or the discovery of a 2018 research proposal containing a veritable blueprint for creating SARS-CoV-2 at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. They won’t know about these things because there is a vortex in the algorithm where uncomfortable news about COVID-19 goes to die.
Too many media outlets and influential elites have become too personally invested in the natural spillover narrative and too embarrassed by the possibility that they’ve been wrong this entire time. They are straining to enforce a virtual blackout on news related to the pandemic’s origins, China’s gross negligence, and the complicity of Western scientists. And in the process, they are hindering our ability to prepare for or prevent the next pandemic.
Nevertheless, there is a reckoning coming. The longer the media and U.S. intelligence agencies avoid the hard truths about COVID-19, the more apparent it will be that our misunderstanding of the pandemic’s origins was born not of ignorance but of malice and deception.
Jeff M. Smith is director of the Asian Studies Center at the Heritage Foundation.
