Covid, Fauci asks for medical records of some Wuhan scientists

Anthony Fauci, the epidemiologist at the top of the US presidential task force on Covid-19, asked China to provide the medical records of nine people whose ailments could provide clues to the origin of the coronavirus. The Financial Times reports it. “I would like to see the medical records of the three people who fell ill in 2019. Did they really get sick? And if so, of what?” Said fauci according to the economic-financial newspaper. Meanwhile, the #faucigate hashtag is depopulated on Twitter The infectious disease specialist also urged China to make available medical records of six miners who fell ill with viral pneumonia after entering a bat cave in China’s Yunnan province in 2012. The cave may have reportedly served as a sort of incubator for the virus that would later be studied at the Wuhan Institute. The origin of the virus is strongly disputed, with US intelligence agencies still examining reports that researchers at the Wuhan virology laboratory, the epicenter of the pandemic, became seriously ill in 2019, a month before the first cases of Covid were reported – 19.However, Chinese scientists and officials have consistently rejected the hypothesis of a laboratory leak, saying the virus could have circulated in other regions before hitting Wuhan and may also have entered China through shipments of imported frozen food or trade wild animals.A spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, Wang Wenbin, declined to comment directly on whether China would release the records of the nine, but firmly denied that the lab was linked to the outbreak of the pandemic. The Wuhan institute, he specified, “released a statement on March 23 stating that no members had been exposed before December 30, 2019, and there had been no cases of infection among staff and students.” Wang reiterated China’s position that reports of a leak from the lab are a “conspiracy theory”.