Joe Biden reopens probe into COVID-19 Wuhan lab origin theory

As the COVID-19 cluster in Melbourne grows by the day, US President Joe Biden announced this week he was re-opening America’s investigation into the Wuhan lab origin theory for the virus, prompting a big rule change from a social media giant.

But a leading infectious diseases physician reckons a new investigation is unlikely to yield results and takes the focus away from fighting the pandemic.

President Biden admitted America’s intelligence community was divided on the origin of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, including whether it came from human contact with an infected animal or a laboratory accident.

“I have now asked the intelligence community to redouble their efforts to collect and analyse information that could bring us closer to a definitive conclusion, and to report back to me in 90 days,” Biden said.

“As part of that report, I have asked for areas of further inquiry that may be required, including specific questions for China.”

In response, Facebook has amended its content restrictions this week to allow posts that claim COVID is man-made, having previously blocked such content during the Trump era.

“In light of ongoing investigations into the origin of COVID-19 and in consultation with public health experts, we will no longer remove the claim that COVID-19 is man-made from our apps,” a Facebook company spokesperson said in a statement.

“We’re continuing to work with health experts to keep pace with the evolving nature of the pandemic and regularly update our policies as new facts and trends emerge.”

Australian Foreign Minister Marise Payne yesterday welcomed President Biden’s announcement.

Microbiologist and infectious diseases physician Professor Paul Griffin told The West Live we might never know the origins of COVID-19.

“It would be good to understand how the virus arose, so we can improve our surveillance and do things to prevent this happening moving forward, but, given the amount of time that’s transpired, it’s very unlikely we’ll get a definitive answer,” Professor Griffin said.

The World Health Organisation sent a team to Wuhan in January in the hopes of learning how the pandemic started, and the resulting report dismissed the theory it originated from a lab accident.

However, the team spent two weeks of the month-long mission in hotel quarantine and admitted they were not entirely confident Chinese authorities shared all information relevant to the investigation.

But Professor Griffin said there was something even more important than finding the source of the pandemic — stopping it.

“In the end, I think we need to focus more on managing (our response to the pandemic) collaboratively so we can get on top of it,” he said.