新型コロナ、中国研究所流出説を支持 米下院小委員会

【ワシントンＡＦＰ＝時事】新型コロナウイルス感染症（ＣＯＶＩＤ－１９）に関する米下院特別小委員会は２日、新型コロナウイルスは中国の研究所から流出した可能性が高いとする説を支持する結論を発表した。（写真は２０２０年５月、記者会見で発言するドナルド・トランプ米大統領と米国立アレルギー感染症研究所〈ＮＩＡＩＤ〉のアンソニー・ファウチ所長〈右〉）
　新型コロナウイルスの起源をめぐっては、米連邦機関、世界保健機関（ＷＨＯ）、さらに世界中の科学者たちがさまざまな結論に達しており、いまだ合意に至っていない。
　大方では中国で動物から広がったと考えられているが、米情報機関は昨年、ヒトの感染例が最初に確認された中国・武漢市にあるウイルス学研究所から、遺伝子操作されたウイルスが流出した可能性があると指摘した。
　米下院の同特別小委員会は２年間にわたり、米国人１１０万人が死亡した流行における連邦政府および州レベルの対応、パンデミック（世界的な流行）の発生源、ワクチン接種の取り組みなどについて検証。２５回の会合、３０回以上のインタビュー資料、１００万ページ以上の文書検証を経て、５２０ページに及ぶ報告書をまとめ、研究所流出説を支持するに至った。
　その中で主な結論の一つとして、米国立衛生研究所（ＮＩＨ）が、論争の的となっている武漢ウイルス研究所の「機能獲得」研究に実際に資金提供していたことが確認されたと報告された。
　調査には、米政府の新型コロナウイルス対策を率いたアンソニー・ファウチ元首席医療顧問の２日間にわたる非公開インタビューも含まれていた。
　ファウチ氏は６月の委員会で、新型コロナウイルスの起源を隠蔽（いんぺい）したことはないと強く否定し、武漢ウイルス研究所が扱っていたコウモリコロナウイルスが、パンデミックを引き起こしたウイルスに変異することは「分子レベルでは不可能」だと主張した。
　だが同報告書は、新型コロナウイルスは「研究所の事故、または研究関連の事故によって出現した可能性が高い」と述べた。
　この他、報告書はロックダウン（都市封鎖）は「利益よりも害を多くもたらした」と述べた。またマスク着用義務は「感染拡大を抑制する効果がなかった」と結論付けているが、これは公共の場でのマスク着用が感染率の低下につながることを示す他の研究結果とは矛盾している。【翻訳編集ＡＦＰＢＢＮｅｗｓ】
〔ＡＦＰ＝時事〕（2024/12/03-19:10）

US lawmakers concluded a two-year investigation Monday into the Covid-19 outbreak that killed 1.1 million Americans -- backing the theory that the virus likely leaked from a Chinese laboratory.
A 520-page report from the Republican-controlled House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic looked at the federal and state-level response, as well as the pandemic's origins and vaccination efforts.
This work will help the United States, and the world, predict the next pandemic, prepare for the next pandemic, protect ourselves from the next pandemic, and hopefully prevent the next pandemic, panel chairman Brad Wenstrup said in a letter to Congress.
US federal agencies, the World Health Organization and scientists across the planet have arrived at different conclusions about the most likely origin of Covid-19, and no consensus has emerged.
Most believe it to have spread from animals in China, but a US intelligence analysis said last year that the virus may have been genetically engineered and escaped from a virology lab in the Chinese city of Wuhan, where human cases first emerged.
The congressional panel was persuaded by the lab leak theory after meeting 25 times, conducting more than 30 transcribed interviews and reviewing more than one million pages of documents.
The investigation included two days of interviews behind closed doors with Anthony Fauci, the government scientist who became the nation's most trusted expert in the chaotic early days of the 2020 outbreak.
Fauci's clashes with former and incoming president Donald Trump over the response sparked fury on the right, and he now lives with security protection following death threats against his family.
Republicans accuse the 83-year-old immunologist of helping to set off the worst pandemic in a century by approving funding passed on to Chinese scientists they accuse of manufacturing the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus that causes Covid-19.
Among its headline conclusions, the report said the National Institutes of Health had indeed funded contentious gain-of-function research -- which seeks to enhance viruses as a way of finding ways to combat them -- at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
Fauci angrily denied covering up the origins of Covid-19 before the panel in June, arguing that it would be molecularly impossible for the bat viruses studied at the lab to be turned into the virus that caused the pandemic.
But the panel's report said SARS-CoV-2 likely emerged because of a laboratory or research-related accident.
- Angry response in Beijing -
Beijing hit back at the report on Tuesday, saying it had no credibility and accusing the United States of using the outbreak for political manipulation.
The authoritative scientific conclusion drawn by the China-WHO joint expert team... is that a laboratory leak is extremely unlikely, foreign ministry spokesperson Lin Jian told a regular news conference.
In the absence of any substantive evidence, the so-called US report has concocted leading conclusions, slandered China (and) planted false evidence, he said.
The probe also found that lockdowns did more harm than good and that mask mandates were ineffective at controlling the spread of Covid-19, contradicting other research showing that masking in public does reduce transmission rates.
Social distancing guidelines also came under criticism, although travel restrictions were deemed to have saved lives.
Investigators found that Trump's Operation Warp Speed -- the publicly-funded project to develop Covid vaccines -- was a tremendous success but that school closures would have an enduring impact on US children.