Trump administration blaming China for COVID-19 pandemic

by Karen Faulkner, Worthy News Correspondent

(Worthy News) – President Trump and US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo have each said in recent days that there is significant evidence COVID-19 originated in a lab in China’s Wuhan province. At the same time, the Trump administration says it is looking into the cause of the coronavirus outbreak and has not published the evidence referred to. China has vehemently denied the allegations.

In a press conference on May 1, President Trump said he had seen evidence which gave him a “high degree of confidence” the virus came from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the Daily Telegraph reported. In answer to questions, Trump said he was “not allowed” to discuss the nature of the evidence.

The President also suggested China may have let the virus spread and that this may have happened accidentally or on purpose. “There are a lot of theories. We have people looking at it very, very strongly,” Trump added. “Scientific people, intelligence people, and others, and when we put it all together we’re going to have a very good answer eventually. China may tell us,” he said.

During an interview with ABC News on May 3, Secretary Pompeo also said there is significant evidence the virus came from the Wuhan lab. Moreover, he said: “China behaved like authoritarian regimes do, it attempted to conceal and hide and confuse.” Asked whether the virus was released accidentally or intentionally, Pompeo said he could not answer because “the Chinese Communist Party has refused to cooperate with world health experts.”

Nevertheless, Dr. Anthony Fauci, the leading medical expert advising the US on its response to COVID-19, has said the virus could not have been deliberately or artificially manipulated. In an interview with National Geographic published Monday, Fauci said: “Everything about the stepwise evolution over time strongly indicates that (this virus) evolved in nature and then jumped species.”

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