Pentagon BLOCKED from sending taxpayer dollars to Wuhan lab: Congress takes action in defense bill after $47 million was funneled into grants for ‘reprehensible’ animal experimentation – including at China’s COVID lab-leak site
Congress is taking action to prevent the Pentagon from using taxpayer money to fund risky animal coronavirus research in Wuhan, China.
A provision in the fiscal year 2024 defense authorization bill passed by the House and Senate this week prohibits the Pentagon from funding experiments at the Wuhan Institute of Virology — which is at the center of the COVID-19 lab leak theory.
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, who included the measure in the NDAA, told DailyMail.com in an exclusive interview this week that U.S. dollars “have historically been diverted to institutions in communist China.”
She is trying to track the money and ensure that future taxpayer dollars are not spent on “experiments that are objectionable to the American public.”
The law also requires the Defense Department to conduct a 10-year audit to examine all money given specifically to EcoHealth Alliance – the charity that funded coronavirus research at the Wuhan lab and is accused of being the source of the outbreak.
DailyMail.com previously reported on federal data showing that the Pentagon has given millions to Dr. Peter Daszak, and Ernst says the total amount has reached $47 million since 2008.
Virologist Shi Zheng-li, left, works with her colleague in the P4 lab of the Wuhan Institute of Virology
A report released last December by House Republican lawmakers in the Intelligence Committee found that there is “indications” that the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) had a laboratory incident linked to China's biological weapons program and that led to COVID-19 'spreading over' to the general public
Exactly how much of that money went to research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology is unknown.
'We know that the Ministry of Defense is one of the largest funders of EcoHealth. And we shouldn't do that,” Ernst continued.
EcoHealth continues to “defy” Congress, she charged, saying the organization is still not providing information about the types of studies they conduct.
The NDAA makes it illegal for the Pentagon to give money to EcoHealth's Chinese research in fiscal year 2024.
The organization has denied all allegations and stated that it “does not support gain-of-function research” at the Wuhan laboratory.
“Any claim to the contrary is based on a misinterpretation or deliberate misrepresentation of the actual research conducted,” the organization previously said.
Government watchdog group White Coat Waste Project applauded the NDAA's acceptance of the provision, but accused the Pentagon of “still wasting millions of taxpayer dollars on EcoHealth.”
“Taxpayers have a right to know how the Department of Defense is spending their money, and we are grateful to Senator Ernst for demanding transparency and combating this reckless government spending on animal testing that threatens public health,” said Senior Vice President Justin Goodman in a thesis.
In September, the Biden administration officially banned taxpayer money from being funneled into the Wuhan lab.
An official statement from the Department of Health and Human Services said the Wuhan Institute of Virology had failed to prove its experiments were safe.
The federal audit looked at three taxpayer-funded research grants awarded to EcoHealth Alliance between 2014 and 2021.
EcoHealth Alliance received $8 million from the National Institutes of Health (NIH) between 2014 and 2021 to outsource to research facilities such as WIV, which received approximately $3.7 million.
HHS said the Wuhan researchers violated the conditions for receiving federal grants because poor biosafety protocols in the laboratory “may have resulted or could result in health problems or other unacceptable outcomes.”
Sen. Joni Ernst, R-Iowa, who included the measure in the NDAA, told DailyMail.com in an exclusive interview this week that U.S. dollars “have historically been diverted to institutions in communist China.”
The ban on federal funding of the WIV will last 10 years, which is seven years longer than the average suspension, although this move is unlikely to protect the agency from criticism over its funding of the experiments at all.
According to the Federal Health Service, researchers in Wuhan had conducted experiments with coronaviruses that went beyond what the terms of the grant allowed. It also alleged that the WIV maintained poor biosecurity standards, potentially putting people at risk.
A report released last year by House Republican lawmakers on the Intelligence Committee found that there are “indications” that the Wuhan Institute of Virology had a laboratory incident linked to China's biological weapons program, which led to that COVID-19 “passed” to the general. public.