Panel Investigating COVID-19's Origins Releases First Report

The World Health Organization (WHO) panel assigned to probe COVID-19's origins released a preliminary report Thursday.

The report states that "currently available epidemiological and sequencing data suggest ancestral strains to SARS-CoV-2 have a zoonotic origin," but also that "neither the virus progenitors nor the natural/intermediate hosts or spill-over event to humans have been identified." It recommends further investigations of "environmental samples collected from specific stalls and drains" at the Huanan seafood market in Wuhan, China, which some have pointed to as the place where COVID-19 could have first spilled over from animals to humans. The panel also noted that there hasn't "been any new data made available to evaluate" the theory that COVID-19 first leaked from a laboratory in Wuhan, and it recommended "further investigations into this and all other possible pathways."

China has been accused of withholding data that would aid the WHO's investigation. When the WHO sent a team to China last year to investigate the pandemic’s origins and issue an initial report, the Chinese government reportedly objected to any mention of the Wuhan lab leak theory in the report.

News sources across the political spectrum covered the report, and highlighted the panel's conclusion that an animal-to-human spillover remains the most likely theory for the pandemic's genesis. Right-rated outlets often focused on how the panel concluded that the lab leak theory couldn't be ruled out and warrants more investigation.