A former National Institutes of Health official testified to a Senate committee on Thursday that the agency did not suppress inquiries into the origins of COVID-19, even as Sen. Josh Hawley, R-Mo., questioned her about private emails suggesting otherwise.
Carrie Wolinetz, who was the chief of staff for then-NIH Director Francis Collins during the pandemic, answered questions from members of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee about federal oversight of risky virus research.
The most heated moment of the hearing began when Hawley pressed Wolinetz about a March 2020 journal article written by several scientists that attempted to invalidate the Chinese lab leak theory of COVID-19’s origins. He cited emails obtained by Congress showing that NIH officials were in contact with the authors and reviewed the article before publication.
“What interests me is that your office was very involved in that paper, which was supposed to be an independent piece of scientific analysis,” Hawley told Wolinetz. He asked if it is “normal” for scientists writing a paper “to get together and talk about how their conclusion’s going to come out.”
Wolinetz answered that “it is quite common for scientists across biomedical research fields, while they’re in the process of doing research, to discuss … ”
“… to pre-bake the outcome?” Hawley interjected.
“I do not believe that … that is an accurate description of the conversations that took place,” Wolinetz replied before clarifying that she “was not present for those conversations.”
“My understanding, based on readouts, is there was a lot of interest in the origins and current understanding of [COVID-19],” Wolinetz told the Missouri senator.
Hawley then highlighted an email in which Collins called lab leak concerns a “very destructive conspiracy” shortly after the paper’s publication. The senator asked again why Collins’ office was “so intent on” quieting speculation that U.S.-funded experiments at a Wuhan, China, lab had created the virus.
“Is it because of the NIH’s role in funding gain-of-function research at the lab?”
Wolinetz again said Hawley’s portrayal of events was “inaccurate.”
Under further tense questioning, she testified that she and her colleagues never “suggested that there wasn’t the possibility that a virus had escaped from a lab.”
Hawley interrupted again, calling her claim “ridiculous.”
The hearing came one day after Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., introduced legislation requiring more oversight of federally funded virus research.
Paul said in opening remarks that his bill is in response to a “web of deception” from federal bureaucrats regarding the gain-of-function research in China “that may have caused the pandemic.”
Some federal agencies such as the FBI have concluded that COVID-19 was most likely a lab creation.