\n \n \n “. concat(self. i18n. t(‘search. voice. recognition_retry’), “\n
A leading medical journal at the center of several pandemic-related controversies on Wednesday published a lead report from the COVID-19 Commission that concluded the fatal pathogen could have leaked from a U. S. lab. USA
The surprising suggestion, which is the only component of a 58-page study on the COVID pandemic and its origins, in The Lancet said it was “possible” that the SARS-CoV-2 virus looked like an herbal overflow event or like a leak from a lab. Although the report mentions services in Wuhan, China, it also states that “independent scholars have not yet investigated” U. S. laboratories. -Viruses related to CoV.
This will be the only way to beat COVID forever
The report also called for new safeguards to prevent long-term herbal overflows, in which an animal transmits a virus to a human, who then transmits it to other humans, and research-related overflows.
But considerations have been expressed about the committee’s chairman, economist Jeffrey Sachs, and his previous comments about the origins of COVID.
Earlier this year, the Columbia University professor said he was “pretty convinced” that the pathogen “came from a U. S. biotech lab. “A U. S. -backed laboratory study program. “An overflow of herbs is also possible, of course. Both hypotheses are viable at this stage.
The following month, Sachs made the impression on a podcast hosted by Robert F. Kennedy Jr. , who has become one of the leading vaccine conspiracy theorists on the Internet and caused outrage by comparing vaccination mandates to the Holocaust. Sachs’ appearance on Kennedy’s Screen came just days after Meta banned Kennedy-run accounts on Facebook and Instagram for spreading incorrect information about COVID.
“Sachs’ appearance on the RFK Jr. podcast. . . undermines the seriousness of the Lancet Comproject project to the point of denying it,” Angela Rasmussen, a virologist at the Vaccines and Infectious Diseases Organization of Canada, told the British Telegraph.
“This is perhaps one of The Lancet’s most embarrassing moments in relation to its role as an administrator and leader in communicating findings on science and medicine,” Rasmussen said, adding that she was “quite surprised at how” the report ignored vital information. origin of covid
Sachs told the outlet that he stood by his previous comments, adding that all Lancet commissioners had approved the final wording of the report.
But Peter Hotez, a member of the Lancet Commission and dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine at Baylor School of Medicine in Texas (and a contributor to the Daily Beast), said there were “diverse opinions” and that he had “pushed by removing” references to American labs in the report because it’s “a distraction. “He added that he was left “speechless” during Sachs’ appearance on Kennedy’s podcast.
Wednesday’s report is the latest controversy surrounding The Lancet and the pandemic.
In February 2020, in the early days of the virus outbreak, The Lancet published a signed letter through 27 public fitness scientists denouncing “conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 has no herbal origin. “The Telegraph later reported that 26 of the 27 signatories had ties to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and the newspaper published a separate letter in 2021 that responded to the former by calling a study-like origin for the virus “plausible,” adding: “Study-like hypotheses are incorrect information and conjecture.
The newspaper also notoriously retracted a may 2020 lead article that questioned the efficacy of using the drugs chloroquine and hydroxychloroquine in the treatment of COVID, all of which then-President Donald Trump had championed. After cutting the article due to considerations about the data used in the study, The Lancet updated its editorial and peer-review policies to decrease the “risks of misconduct in studies and publication. “
And even before the coronavirus pandemic, The Lancet unknowingly played a central role in shaping the fashionable anti-vaccine movement in the twentieth century. In 1998, the journal published an article through former British doctor Andrew Wakefield linking the MMR vaccine to autism. The study eventually turned out to be a complete fraud and was withdrawn in 2010, with Wakefield banned from practising medicine in the UK.
In a Daily Beast article, a Lancet spokesperson said: “The Lancet COVID-19 Commission includes 11 teams running in spaces ranging from vaccine progression to humanitarian aid strategies, safe workplaces and global economic recovery.
“Throughout the Commission’s two years of work, The Lancet, in collaboration with Commission Chair Professor Jeffrey Sachs, has evaluated the work of each organisation in progress as clinical evidence on COVID-19 evolves to ensure that the latest peer-reviewed report will provide new and valuable information. Information to aid a coordinated global reaction to COVID-19, as well as to prevent long-term pandemics and involve long-term outbreaks.
Learn more about The Daily Beast.
Get the scoops and scandals of Biggest Daily Beast in your inbox. Register now.
Stay informed and get unlimited or unpublished reports from the Daily Beast. Subscribe now.