It has been revealed that the US is allocating taxpayer funds to a Chinese army laboratory to enhance the virulence of bird flu viruses in humans, and 18 lawmakers are demanding explanations.
In a strongly worded letter to USDA Secretary Tom Vilsack last week, the bipartisan group expressed concern that this research, funded by American taxpayers, has the potential to create new, dangerous lab-engineered virus strains that pose a threat to national security and public health.
The collaboration, amounting to $1 million, is between the USDA and the Chinese Academy of Sciences, which is controlled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) and oversees the Wuhan lab implicated in the Covid lab-leak theory.
In February, it emerged that the United States government was directing $1 million to China to investigate whether scientists could enhance the transmissibility of ‘highly pathogenic avian influenza' to mammals through gain-of-function research.
Government documents indicated that the collaboration commenced in April 2021 and is slated to receive funding until March 2026.
The project is funded through the USDA, with primary collaborators including the USDA Southeast Poultry Research Laboratory, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, and the University of Edinburgh’s Roslin Institute—a partner of the Wuhan lab.
Despite restrictions on similar research in 2022 and mounting concerns regarding questionable Chinese studies potentially initiating the Covid pandemic, this project has continued.
The research coincides with mounting concerns about bird flu. Earlier this month, a farm worker in Texas contracted the H5N1 strain, which is spreading among cattle across the US, marking only the second reported case in an American.
