Proximal Orchestrations

The scientists who assured the world that the Covid-19 virus could not have been engineered in a laboratory based their pivotal decision on a single piece of flawed evidence. Their discussion of the scientific facts was interspersed with frequent speculation about the public impact of their findings. Theirs was no openminded search for the truth; one scientist expressed his determination from the start to disprove the possibility of a lab leak. In the rush to publish their predetermined conclusion, they ignored a critical viral feature that points to manipulation.

These departures from customary scientific procedure are evident from a new batch of emails released to Jimmy Tobias, a freelance writer, after litigation to block the National Institutes of Health (NIH) from making extensive redactions. The emails were exchanged principally between Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), a branch of the NIH, and Jeremy Farrar, director of the Wellcome Trust, a large medical research foundation in London.