GOP Senate report finds COVID-19 ‘most likely’ leaked out of Chinese lab

A Senate investigation into the origins of COVID-19 has concluded that the virus most likely leaked out of a Chinese laboratory.

The interim report, released by Republicans on the Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee on Thursday, found a lack of evidence supporting the theory that COVID-19 was passed from animals to humans, and named China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology as the likely source of the virus. 

“Based on the analysis of the publicly available information, it appears reasonable to conclude that the COVID-19 pandemic was, more likely than not, the result of a research-related incident,” the report read.

“New information, made publicly available and independently verifiable, could change this assessment. However, the hypothesis of a natural zoonotic origin no longer deserves the benefit of the doubt or the presumption of accuracy.”

The Senate HELP Committee Republicans cite “high-risk” coronavirus research being conducted at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and evidence of “persistent biosafety problems” at the lab as factors that led them to the lab-leak conclusion.