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| Science & Technology |
| Former NIH Head Secretly Helped With Paper Dismissing Theory COVID-19 Came From Lab |
| 2026-06-15 |
| Zero Hedge Authored by Zachary Stieber via The Epoch Times, Then-National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director Dr. Francis Collins, around the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, acknowledged that he secretly assisted with a paper stating the virus that causes COVID-19 "is not a laboratory construct or a purposefully manipulated virus," according to a newly released missive. "This is work that Tony, Jeremy, Larry, and I helped with, but are appropriately not mentioned explicitly in the paper," Collins said in the March 6, 2020, email to NIH officials, which was released by Sen. Rand Paul (R-Ky.) on June 11. Tony refers to Dr. Anthony Fauci, the longtime head of the NIH's National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases through late 2022. Jeremy refers to Jeremy Farrar, at the time the director of the Wellcome Trust. Larry refers to Dr. Lawrence Tabak, an NIH official. Collins noted the conclusion that stated, "The analysis of public genome sequence data from SARS-CoV-2 and related viruses found no evidence that the virus was made in a laboratory or otherwise engineered." SARS-CoV-2 is the coronavirus that causes COVID-19. The first COVID-19 cases appeared in Wuhan, China, in 2019, near a laboratory that was conducting enhanced experiments on coronaviruses funded by the NIH. Collins was responding to an email from Kristian Andersen, one of the authors of the paper, which was titled "The Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2." Andersen and other scientists said in the paper, published on March 17, 2020, in Nature Medicine, that they analyzed data and concluded that it came from nature. To date, no natural source has been identified for the virus. The Trump administration maintains the virus came from the Wuhan lab. The paper did not mention any contributions from Collins, Fauci, Tabak, or Farrar, who made at least one critical change to the document, according to emails released by lawmakers in 2023. It thanked American virologist Michael Farzan "for discussions" and the Wellcome Trust "for support." Nature did not return a request for comment by the time of publication. Collins did not respond to a request for comment. Collins told lawmakers in 2024 that his role "was for information, not for me to edit," that he never edited or suggested edits to the paper, and that, to his knowledge, neither did Fauci or Farrar. He also said he is not a virology expert. Now he tells us. Anyway, rest at the link. Related: Francis Collins 01/20/2026 Emails show Fauci, Collins plotting to circumvent 'impressive' data for COVID natural immunity Francis Collins 09/11/2025 New Smoking Gun Emails Reveal Fauci COVID Coverup Francis Collins 07/14/2025 NIH Director Bhattacharya warns U.S. taxpayers are funding science journals compromised by China |
| Posted by:Thing From Snowy Mountain |
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| Posted by: Skidmark 2026-06-15 21:23 |
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| Posted by: NN2N1 2026-06-15 21:14 |
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| Posted by: Frank G 2026-06-15 17:40 |
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| Posted by: NN2N1 2026-06-15 17:37 |