NIH Removes Previous Claims Denying Covid-19 Lab Leak Theory

On Friday, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) informed Blaze News that it has revised its website to eliminate past assertions that dismissed the theory suggesting a lab leak as the origin of Covid-19.

“NIH has removed these effectively false positions from its last administration.”

As of Thursday, the NIH website stated:

Unfortunately, the origin of SARS-CoV-2 has not yet been identified, leading to misleading and inaccurate accusations regarding the research supported by NIAID on naturally occurring bat coronaviruses. Specifically, these accusations reference research conducted at the Wuhan Institute in China, funded through sub-awards from the NIH’s EcoHealth Alliance. However, the naturally occurring bat coronavirus studied through this funding was genetically distinct from SARS-CoV-2 and could not have caused the Covid-19 pandemic.

Blaze News reached out to the NIH to inquire if they were aware of the last webpage review conducted in March 2022 and whether they planned to revise the site to remove the statement labeling the lab leak theory as a hoax.

The NIH replied that they had updated their website recently.

Andrew Nixon, the communications director for the Department of Health and Human Services, stated that “the Biden-era NIH’s position on the origins of the Covid pandemic is that the lab leak theory is a conspiracy theory, supported by substantial scientific and forensic evidence to the contrary.”

In the meantime, the NIH had confirmed that as of Friday afternoon, the associated webpage had been removed. Users were met with a message saying, “you are not permitted to access this page.”

Nixon also mentioned that the “true origin” of the virus can be found on the White House website, which states that Covid-19 has “biological properties not found in nature,” suggesting data supports the possibility of human-derived cases. Additionally, the website points to the Wuhan lab’s “history of conducting gain-of-function research… at an insufficient biosafety level.”

Jay Bhattacharya, who was involved with the Trump administration’s National Health Institute, has been a prominent critic of the official narrative, asserting that there has been a cover-up regarding the origins of the virus.

In May, Bhattacharya expressed confidence that a research experiment in Wuhan, China, contributed to the pandemic through lab leaks.