WASHINGTON – The Shadow, the New York City-based ecohealth alliance that had funneled Hundreds of thousands of dollars in federal grant money A Chinese laboratory linked to the COVID-19 outbreak recently received more than $650,000 from the National Institutes of Health to study a similar virus in Southeast Asia.
The $653,392 grant, which was awarded Sept. 21, is being administered by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases—whose director Dr. Anthony Fauci announced in August that He was stepping down at the end of this year,
The EcoHealth Alliance, led by Peter Daszak, previously received millions of grants to study similar issues – directing some of those funds to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, from where many believe COVID-19 has caused 11 million. leaked in the city of K.K. and triggered the worst ever global pandemic. in 100 years.
A previously released email has documented a close relationship between Daszak and Fauci, who received a “personal thank you” In April 2020 from EcoHealth chief to support the theory – pushed by Daszak – that COVID-19 spreads naturally from bats to humans.
Emails obtained in June 2021 by the conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch showed that EcoHealth received approximately $3.75 million between fiscal years 2014 and 2019, entitled “Understanding the Risk of the Emergence of Bat Coronavirus Diseases”, of which Over $800,000 was redirected. Wuhan Lab.
On April 15, 2020, NIH Principal Deputy Director Lawrence Tabak to Fauci and then-NIH Director Dr. Francis Collins’ email described the EcoHealth study as “a large multi-country study with Wuhan being a site”.
In addition to several EcoHealth research sites in China, Tabak’s email mentions sites in “Thailand, Cambodia, Laos, Vietnam, Malaysia, Indonesia and Myanmar”.
That project raised questions about the origins of the spread of the coronavirus because its proposal acknowledged the risky nature of the work, noting that exposure to the virus was possible “while working in caves with high bat densities and inhalation of fecal dust.” is likely to.”
In October last year, Tabak accepted one in Letter to Representative James Comer (R-Q.) that the project involved so-called “gain-of-function” research—in which viruses were made more transmissible or virulent— Despite previous denials Fauci before Congress.
According to a description on the NIH’s website, the latest EcoHealth project will take place in Laos, Myanmar and Vietnam and will study “behavioral and environmental risk factors” that cause coronavirus wildlife-to-human transmission, “drivers of risk and community transmission.” assess and spread” and “test potential public health interventions to inhibit spread”.
Work on the new project will also include studies in Wuhan, China, where the coronavirus is believed to have first spread from bats to humans.
“Most epidemics are caused by viruses of animal-origin, which emerge in areas where people have high contact with wildlife and where diseases or outbreaks may be missed,” the declaration said. Is.”
“This project builds on two decades of work that identified the border region of southern China, Myanmar, Laos and Vietnam as a high risk and potential site for the future emergence of novel coronaviruses where SARS-CoV-2 has been identified. [COVID-19] According to the announcement, the first ‘spill over’ from bats to people.
The new project will rapidly supply viral sequences and isolates for use in vaccine and therapeutic development, including “prototype pathogen” vaccines.
“Our long-term goal is that this work will serve as a model for building pandemic preparedness strategies to better predict the sites and communities where wildlife-native viruses are most likely to emerge, and to prevent the emergence of viruses that are likely to emerge. For [emerging infection disease] Hotspots around the world. ,