There is now very little doubt that Covid leaked from a lab
What was the worst industrial accident in history? Bhopal in India, where in 1984, at least 25,000 people died as a result of a leak of methyl isocyanate from a pesticide plant? No, if – as most people who have examined the evidence now believe – the Covid pandemic began as a result of a laboratory leak, then what happened in Wuhan, China was worse than a thousand Bhopals. It killed around 28million people – and was by far the most lethal industrial or scientific accident that has ever occurred.
Yet the silence of members of the scientific establishment about even the possibility of a laboratory leak in Wuhan is deafening. They refuse to debate it – quite literally. The World Health Organisation studiously avoids talking about it. I tried to get the Royal Society to organise a debate: it’s not a suitable topic for discussion, it replied. I tried the Academy of Medical Sciences, of which I am a fellow: too controversial, it said. A former president of the Royal Society told me he hopes we never find out what happened, lest it annoy the Chinese. Would he have said the same about Bhopal, I wondered, or a plane crash?
Earlier this year, I was approached by Open to Debate, an online debating forum, to propose the motion that Covid probably began with a lab accident. I quickly agreed. The organiser then asked more than 30 scientists, journalists and politicians to oppose me, including some who have vocally argued that it cannot possibly have come from a lab. They all said no, sometimes with a barrage of insults about me. Finally, a Nobel-prize winning immunologist in Australia agreed. But two weeks later, he pulled out.
