US intelligence report on COVID-19 origins rejects some points raised by lab leak theory proponents

A new U.S. intelligence report rejects several points raised by those who argue COVID-19 leaked from a Chinese lab. It instead reiterates that American spy agencies remain divided over how the pandemic began. Some think it was caused by a lab accident; others think it naturally transmitted from animals to humans. The report was issued Friday at the behest of Congress, which in March passed a bill giving U.S. intelligence 90 days to declassify intelligence related to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The report says spy agencies can’t draw conclusions from allegations that some Wuhan researchers fell sick in fall 2019 or that the Wuhan lab experimented with genetically engineered viruses.