China began developing Covid-19 vaccines before the outbreak officially started, a new report claims.
A 300-page document prepared by the US Senate suggests Chinese researchers began work on a vaccine program in mid-November 2019.
It adds to evidence that the country was trying to cover up early infections before notifying the World Health Organization (WHO) on Dec. 31.
The report also concludes that the pandemic most likely stemmed from a laboratory leak and was the result of an “investigation-related incident” in Wuhan.
And it even suggests that there may have been two accidental spillover events just weeks apart.
A 300-page document prepared by the US Senate suggests Chinese researchers began work on a vaccine program in mid-November 2019. Security personnel stand guard outside the Wuhan Institute of Virology during a WHO visit in 2021
It adds to evidence that China tried to cover up early infections before notifying the World Health Organization (WHO) on Dec. 31. Pictured: Two staff members cross a road while delivering vegetables to a hospital in Wuhan, 2020
The report concludes that the pandemic most likely stemmed from a laboratory leak and was the result of an “investigation-related incident” in Wuhan. Pictured: The P4 Laboratory of the Wuhan Institute of Virology in 2020
The document, released to US news website Axios, is the full version of a 35-page executive summary published in October by the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee.
It read: “The Covid-19 pandemic was, more than likely, the result of a research-related incident.
New information, made public 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 correctness.”
Part of the report focuses on vaccine development in China.
Research by the committee shows that a team led by Professor Yusen Zhou, of the Academy of Military Medical Sciences, filed a patent for a Covid-19 vaccine on February 24, 2020.
Experts interviewed by the researchers said it would have taken at least two to three months to get to this stage — suggesting work must have started in November 2019, a month before China publicly released details about the virus.
The report reads: “This investigation found evidence that China started developing the SARS-CoV-2 virus vaccine no later than November 2019.
Research by the committee shows that a team led by Professor Yusen Zhou, of the Academy of Military Medical Sciences, filed a patent for a Covid-19 vaccine on February 24, 2020. Pictured: Pfizer vaccine in November 2020
Experts interviewed by the researchers said it would have taken at least two to three months to get to this stage — suggesting work must have started in November 2019, a month before China publicly released details about the virus. Pictured: a Moderna vaccine in London
“To start building a vaccine construct, developers needed to have the full genomic sequence of SARS-CoV-2. The full genomic sequence of SARS-CoV-2 was not publicly released until January 11, 2020.
‘Normally, a sample from an infected patient is used to generate the sequence. Alternatively, a sample from an infected animal can be used.
“Therefore, in order to begin vaccine development, the People’s Republic of China had to find a person or animal infected with SARS-CoV-2 before mid-November 2019, in order to have time to decide to start a vaccine development program.”
Analysis of early circulating Wuhan Covid strains also supports the possibility of two spillover events just weeks apart, the report adds.
Slight genetic differences in early circulating strains suggest that two lineages of the same virus may have originated at the same time and evolved in different pathways, the review said.
It adds that epidemiological models and reports of early Covid cases indicate that mid-October to mid-November 2019 was the most likely time frame for the virus to enter humans.
However, it did not offer a “definitive” conclusion about the origins of the pandemic.
Senator Roger Marshall, who released the report earlier this week, said: “This report is a critical development in getting to the bottom of the true origins of Covid-19 and exposing the deceit of those who tried to hide how this pandemic started.
“A preponderance of evidence in this report suggests that there were two separate accidental lab leaks dating back to the fall of 2019 in Wuhan, China, with significant evidence supporting that Covid-19 was a lab-created and altered virus.
This report also concludes that the Chinese Communist Party responded to the coronavirus months before the rest of the world was even aware of its existence, but that China failed to inform the global community of the unfolding disaster.’