U.S.-Funded Scientist Among Three Chinese Researchers Who Fell Ill Amid Early Covid-19 Outbreak

A prominent scientist who worked on coronavirus projects funded by the U.S. government is one of three Chinese researchers who became sick with an unspecified illness during the initial outbreak of Covid-19, according to current and former U.S. officials.

The identity and role of the researchers is one piece of intelligence that has been cited by proponents of the judgment that the pandemic originated with a lab leak, though the nature of their illness hasn’t been conclusively established. 

Ben Hu, a scientist at the Wuhan Institute of Virology who had done extensive laboratory research on how coronaviruses infect humans, was identified in U.S. intelligence reports as one of the researchers who became ill in November 2019 with symptoms that American officials said were consistent with either Covid-19 or a seasonal illness. None of the researchers died.