NYT author criticizes the political bias that contributed to the concealment of the lab leak incident
Hallelujah: The compelling evidence that COVID leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology finally made it into The New York Times.
The paper ran molecular biologist Alina Chan’s essay laying out the damning facts, and her mild comment that, for years, “partisan politics have derailed the search for the truth about a catastrophe that has touched us all.”
Just whose “partisan politics” did Chan have in mind? The Times doesn’t say, but the omission sticks out like a COVID-inflamed lung.
After all, back in 2021, the Times’ lead COVID reporter, Apoorva Mandavilli, not only dismissed the possibility the bug escaped from the Wuhan lab but suggested such claims were racist: “Someday we will stop talking about the lab leak theory and maybe even admit its racist roots,” she tweeted.
The Gray Lady itself aimed to suppress any suspicion COVID originated in a lab. Even before the pandemic fully erupted, it mocked Sen. Tom Cotton for merely wondering if a lab-leak was possible, calling the a “fringe theory.”
The Times wasn’t the only one practicing “partisan politics”: CNN and MSNBC called lab-leak a “debunked” conspiracy theory. NPR (falsely) asserted, “Scientists Debunk Lab Accident Theory of Pandemic Emergence.”
Social-media companies outright censored lab-leak claims: Facebook banned a Post opinion column by Steven Mosher for speculating on the possibility.
As recently as Monday, an AP story bizarrely claimed “many scientists believe the virus most likely emerged in nature” and “there’s no new scientific information” backing the lab-leak explanation.
Feeding the suppression drive were the very culprits behind the dangerous Wuhan research: Anthony Fauci, his National Institutes of Health boss Francis Collins, Peter Daszak at EcoHealth (which oversaw the research) and other researchers — all of whom conspired to falsely claim the bug jumped naturally from an animal to humans.
In congressional testimony Monday, Fauci backtracked and weaseled his way around numerous troubling questions on his actions and assertions during the pandemic.
But for years, left-leaning outlets discredited anyone who dared to question “the science” or people like Fauci, who once claimed he was science.
Chan is certainly right to fault “partisan politics” for the long delay in facing these facts — a tragic delay: Unraveling that mystery early might’ve helped scientists better understand the bug itself, perhaps leading to a faster vaccine.
And early clarity could’ve led to stronger efforts to push China to be cooperative and added pressure to end the risky research likely behind the virus’ creation.
Good on the Times for running Chan’s piece, but boo on it, along with others on the left, for putting those pernicious “politics” first.
