Claim: Obama Administration Gives $ 3.7 Million to Research Institute in Wuhan, China

The origin of coronaviruses has become an increasingly hot issue, allowing conspiracy theory to gain traction online and among prominent actors.

The allegation that the U.S. government has helped fund coronavirus research Daily email was reported “It shows that the Wuhan Virology Institute conducted a coronavirus experiment on mammals captured more than 1,000 miles away in Yunnan – funded by a $ 3.7 million grant from the US government. I got the document.

The report received a lot of attention on social media, but the claim was repeated by a prominent politician.

“For years, the US government has funded cruel animal testing at the Wuhan Virology Institute. It may have contributed to the global spread of COVID-19.” April 13, R-Fla. Rep. Matt Gaetz tweeted. Gates later praised President Donald Trump Fox News “A commitment to end this last US grant awarded to the Wuhan Institute by the Obama administration!”

inside Press conference on April 17Newsmax reporter asked Trump about the grant. “This grant will soon be over. It was made years ago. Who was the president at the time?”

Social media posts imply that such research is relevant to the current pandemic.

“We have discovered that the US government has illegally provided a $ 3.7 million grant to # China’s #Wuhan Labs. Many have pointed to the cause of current virus scams.” April 13 Instagram Post Read from @freedom_faction.

“ WELL WELL WELL WELL WELL WELL A CHINESE LAB IN WUHAN 3.7 M GRANT to study the corona virus WHAT A COINCIDENCE !!! ” Facebook user wrote on April 19. There are over 55,000 shares in the post.

so Published the Wall Street Journal on April 21Senator Tom Cotton, R-Ark, accused Beijing of concealing its involvement in the origin of the virus. “This evidence is certainly contextual, but it all refers to the Wuhan Institute,” wrote Senator.

“Why did the US (NIH) donate $ 3.7 million to the Wuhan Institute in China in 2017? Such grants were banned in 2014.” Former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani tweeted on April 26.

The claim that the Obama administration funded coronavirus research seems to refer to grants to the EcoHealth Alliance by the National Institutes of Health, a research group that tracks emerging diseases. The grant was supervised directly by NIH and continued until recently canceled under the Trump administration.

EcoHealth Alliance and coronavirus research

of EcoHealth Alliance A non-governmental research group focused on emerging diseases caused by human-animal interactions. of National Institutes of Health have Consistently funded the organization Projects since 2002.

In 2014, NIH approved a grant to the EcoHealth Alliance.Understanding the risk of bat coronavirus outbreak. In this project, we worked with researchers at the Wuhan Virology Institute to study the risk of bat coronavirus and possible human transmission.

The first five-year grant was reapproved by the Trump administration in July 2019. A total of $ 3,378,896 of NIH funding was directed by the government to the project.

A project was established to “ understand the factors that allow coronaviruses, including relatives of SARS, to evolve and jump into human populations ” how zoonoses move from bats to humans Has brought about 20 scientific reports of

Fact check: Is COVID-19 caused by human consumption of animals?

According to Robert Kessler, a spokesperson for the EcoHealth Alliance, Wuhan Research Institute received approximately $ 600,000 from the NIH through two grants that NeH has approved for the EcoHealth Alliance. The funding was for the collection and analysis of virus samples.

For the grant approved in 2014, about $ 133,000 was sent to the lab in the first four years and about $ 66,000 was donated last year. For the second grant approved in 2019, Wuhan Research Institute allocated approximately $ 76,000, but none was actually remitted before the end of the grant.

“It’s difficult to do this work in other countries. It’s very difficult. It takes a lot of travel.” Peter Daszak, President of the EcoHealth Alliance, told USA TODAY.

“There are no high-risk viruses to public health in the US, but in China. If you want to know anything about the next pandemic, you need to work in countries where these viruses exist.”

Fact check: Coronaviruses were born in China, none other, researchers and researchers say

On April 23, the National Institutes of Health notified the EcoHealth Alliance that the funding from the agency was gone and the remaining grants were cancelled.

“NIH can see that the grant to EcoHealth Alliance Inc. has ended. The grant was $ 3.4 million over six years and was distributed to all sites. The main award winner, EcoHealth Health Alliance Inc. (New York), and deputy winners Wuhan Virology Institute (Wuhan), East China Normal University (Shanghai), NIH, in a statement to USA TODAY, Institute for Pathogen Biology (Beijing), and Duke Presented at NUS Medical School (Singapore): “NIH has not discussed the details of the specific grant decision process.”

Also the agency Quoted the statement From the Bureau of State Intelligence, which said intelligence services continue to investigate the origin of COVID-19.

More: Trump said he saw evidence that the coronavirus came from a Chinese research institute. US intelligence says it wasn’t artificial

“The US federal government has confirmed that working in places like the Wuhan Virology Institute is fine. Work with labs and organizations without prior approval by the US Government and / or government agencies No, “Dazak told USA TODAY.

It is not uncommon for the United States to fund research projects in other countries. NIH every year $ 32 billion in biomedical research Funding organizations around the world.

National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, A subset of NIH that deals with disease research, Funding 8,598 active projects Total $ 5,927,849,026 worldwide. Many of these projects with different research goals Has been done in more than a dozen countries Thousands of domestic plus outside of the United States.

of Wuhan Virology Institute SARS-CoV-2 is a state-owned research institute in Wuhan, China where there is a high possibility of occurrence. Founded in 2015, this institute was China’s first Level 4 biosafety and was the highest standard aimed at treating highly infectious or deadly pathogens.

Controversy over possible institutional involvement in the origin of coronaviruses Continued at the highest levels of US and Chinese government. There is no evidence that the current government’s funding of the Wuhan Virology Institute caused the current pandemic.

Fact check: Coronavirus is not artificial or engineered, but its origin remains unknown

Projects funded by the Obama and Trump administrations have produced research highlighting the risk of outbreaks such as SARS-CoV-2 in southern China. Summary proposal The project cites concerns that diseases such as SARS-CoV, or earlier outbreaks of SARS, may occur locally.

“Our mission is to understand the causes of pandemics and prevent them. What we have discovered is that China is a hotspot for emerging diseases,” Dazak says at the EcoHealth Alliance’s research efforts. I talked about. “And when these illnesses are transmitted to people, they travel by plane and the virus always spreads to the countries with the most travel: the United States and Europe. The reason we do this is because the public To protect hygiene. “

Our verdict: partly wrong

We rate this claim as partially incorrect because some errors were not supported by Google’s research. It is misleading to claim that the Obama administration funded a Chinese research institute. It’s true that an American research group was funded a project that worked with a Chinese organization. However, I argue that funding somehow helped create the current pandemic, but there is no basis. In addition, a total of $ 3.7 million was donated to the Wuhan Virology Institute, and only about $ 600,000.

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