Letter of inquiry from the US House Committee on Oversight and Reform to Dr. Kristian Andersen

"Dear Dr. Andersen:

... We are continuing to conduct oversight of the U.S. government’s response to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, and specifically apparent conflicts of interest, suppression of scientific discourse, and abuse of official government resources. Documents in the custody of the National Institutes of Health (NIH) reveal how a group of scientists—including you—initially believed COVID-19 to be man-made before reversing course and claiming otherwise following discussions with senior government health officials. This sequence of events suggests a possible coordinated effort to conceal evidence pointing to a lab leak in Wuhan, China...

On February 1, 2020, according to records, you took part in a teleconference with Dr. Francis Collins, Dr. Anthony Fauci, and other scientists. Dr. Collins and Dr. Fauci were the only two U.S. officials on the call. Before, during, and after the call, some scientists expressed grave concerns that COVID-19 may have leaked out of the Wuhan Institute of Virology and that COVID-19 may have been partially engineered. It is unclear whether Dr. Collins or Dr. Fauci ever relayed these serious concerns to policymakers through the proper chains of command. According to the NIH documents:

• On January 31, 2020, you wrote in an email to Dr. Fauci and others: 'The unusual features of the virus make up a really small part of the genome (<0.1%) so one has to look really closely at all the sequences to see that some of the features (potentially) look engineered . . . . Eddie [Holmes], Bob [Garry], Mike [Farzan], and myself all find the genome inconsistent with expectations from evolutionary theory.'
• On February 2, 2020, Dr. Robert Garry similarly wrote, 'I really can’t think of a plausible natural scenario . . . . I just can’t figure out how this gets accomplished in nature . . . . Of course, in the lab it would be easy . . . .'
• On February 2, 2020, Dr. Michael Farzan wrote he was 'bothered by the furin site and ha[d] a hard time explain[ing] that as an event outside the lab . . . . I am 70:30 or 60:40 [lab].'
• On February 2, 2020, Dr. Andrew Rambaut stated, 'From a (natural) evolutionary point of view the only thing here that strikes me as unusual is the furin cleavage site.'
• On February 4, 2020, Dr. Edward Holmes indicated that he was '60-40 lab . . . .'
• On February 4, 2020, Dr. Jeremy Farrar wrote, 'I am 50-50 [lab].'

Despite these private statements, you and the other scientists were later involved in the drafting and publication of a correspondence in Nature Medicine entitled, 'The Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2' [hereinafter Proximal Origin]. Proximal Origin unequivocally stated a consensus view 'that SARS-CoV-2 is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus.' Proximal Origin was written by February 4, 2020, less than 48 hours after each of the authors privately expressed concern on the teleconference that COVID-19 originated in a lab. It is unclear what scientific facts, if any, changed in that short amount of time. Newly released communications suggest that Dr. Collins hoped Proximal Origin would 'put down' the hypothesis that COVID-19 originated in a lab and that Dr. Collins, in fact, wanted to do more to silence this debate.  Specifically, Dr. Collins wrote to Dr. Fauci: 'I hoped [Proximal Origin] . . . . would settle this . . . . Anything more [NIH] can do?' Dr. Collins’s question about what 'more' NIH could do to 'settle' the debate implies that he, Dr. Fauci, and the NIH were involved in an initial effort—i.e. Proximal Origin—to suppress dissent about the origins of COVID-19.

Alarmingly, it appears that the decision to suppress the lab-leak hypothesis was rooted in political calculations rather than scientific principles. NIH documents show that scientists on the February 1, 2020, teleconference pushed the natural evolution theory because they believed the lab-leak hypothesis could direct too much scrutiny towards China. For example, in one email, Dr. Collins claimed a lab-leak hypothesis would do 'great potential harm to science and international harmony.' Similarly, Dr. Ron Fouchier claimed a lab-leak hypothesis would do 'unnecessary harm to science in general and science in China in particular.' In fact, Dr. Garry later stated the consensus on the teleconference was '1. Don’t try to write a paper at all . . . or 2. If you do write it[,] don’t mention a lab origin as that will just add fuel to the conspiracists.'

Proximal Origin was subsequently cited as scientific proof that COVID-19 did not originate in a lab in the now infamous letter in The Lancet entitled, 'Statement in support of the scientists, public health professionals, and medical professionals of China combatting COVID19.' The scientific community, media, and Big Tech used The Lancet letter to censor and suppress all other hypotheses, going so far as to call the lab leak hypothesis a 'conspiracy theory.' Eventually, more than a year later, The Lancet published an addendum clarifying previously undisclosed monetary conflicts of interest."