WASHINGTON (AP) 鈥� Barring an unforeseen breakthrough, intelligence agencies won鈥檛 be able to conclude whether COVID-19 spread by animal-to-human transmission or leaked from a lab, officials said Friday in releasing a fuller version of their review into the origins of the pandemic.
The paper issued by the Director of National Intelligence elaborates on findings released in August of a 90-day review . That review said that U.S. intelligence agencies but that analysts do not believe the virus was developed as a bioweapon and that most agencies believe the virus was not genetically engineered.
China has resisted global pressure to cooperate fully with investigations into the pandemic or provide access to genetic sequences of coronaviruses kept at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which remains a subject of speculation for its research and reported safety problems. Biden launched the review amid growing momentum for the theory 鈥� initially broadly dismissed by experts 鈥� that the virus leaked from the Wuhan lab. Former President Donald Trump and his supporters long argued that a lab leak was possible as they sought to deflect criticism of his handling of the pandemic.
China remains an exceedingly difficult place for intelligence operations and has fought back against allegations that it mishandled the emergence of the pandemic, which has killed 5 million people worldwide. Senior officials involved in the full report鈥檚 drafting said they hoped it would better inform the public about the challenges of determining the virus's origins.
鈥淲e don't think we're one or two reports away from being able to understand it,鈥� said one official, who spoke on condition of anonymity to discuss intelligence matters.
The full report notes that the Wuhan Institute of Virology 鈥減reviously created chimeras, or combinations, of SARS-like coronaviruses, but this information does not provide insight into whether SARS Cov-2 was genetically engineered by the WIV.鈥�
Information that lab researchers sought medical treatment for a respiratory illness in November 2019 鈥渋s not diagnostic of the pandemic鈥檚 origins,鈥� the report said.
And allegations that China launched the virus as a bioweapon were dismissed because their proponents 鈥渄o not have direct access to the Wuhan Institute of Virology," are making scientifically invalid claims or are accused of spreading disinformation, the report said.
Four agencies within the intelligence community said with low confidence that the virus was initially transmitted from an animal to a human. A fifth intelligence agency believed with moderate confidence that the first human infection was linked to a lab.
Prior to writing the report, analysts conducted what the report describes as a 鈥淭eam A/Team B鈥� debate to try to strengthen or weaken each hypothesis.
Confirming with 100% certainty the origin of a virus is often not fast, easy or always even possible.
In the case of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS 鈥� a disease caused by a beta coronavirus, like the current coronavirus 鈥� researchers first identified the virus in February 2003. Later that year, scientists discovered the likely intermediary hosts: Himalayan palm civets found at live-animal markets in Guangdong, China. But it wasn鈥檛 until 2017 that researchers traced the likely original source of the virus to bat caves in China鈥檚 Yunnan province.
___
Associated Press writer Christina Larson in Washington contributed to this report.
Nomaan Merchant, The Associated Press
