If a plane goes down, there has to be an investigation. Otherwise, no one would feel safe flying again. But a virus from China has killed 540,000 people in our country so far -- equal to two thousand jumbo jet crashes -- and the Biden administration is doing nothing to get to the bottom of it.
Scientists worldwide are divided over whether the virus jumped naturally from the animal world to humans, or whether the virus accidentally leaked from a lab such as the Wuhan Institute of Virology, where biowarfare research is conducted.
The Chinese view biological warfare as the future, and scientists are developing genetic and viral weapons. The State Department has warned about low safety standards at Chinese labs, including the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and the risk of deadly leaks.
President Joe Biden is ignoring the danger as if another pandemic won't happen.
His 200-page COVID-19 strategic plan fails to mention China or the disease's origins. Biden rejoined the WHO with no conditions attached, even though WHO lied to the world about China's cover-up of the initial outbreak, and renamed the virus COVID-19 to obscure its country of origin.
Amazingly, the Biden administration insists it can get the WHO to honestly investigate the virus's origins. That's like relying on the Mafia to investigate organized crime.
Biden's national security adviser Jake Sullivan said that what America needs is "a credible open, transparent international investigation led by the World Health Organization." That's an oxymoron.
WHO did sponsor an investigation. But it was fake. It granted China veto power over which scientists participated, barring those proposed by Washington, D.C. Chinese investigators were muzzled and barred from even dining with the international scientists.
The international group had no access to raw lab data or medical records of the earliest patients. Some of these patients had not been to the Wuhan Live Market, making it implausible they caught the virus from an animal. Three of the earliest patients were Wuhan Institute of Virology employees who all fell sick and were hospitalized with an unidentified virus in the first half of November 2019.
The Chinese Communist Party blocked international investigators from any evidence suggesting a lab leak. "It's just a great coup by China," says Dartmouth scientist Daniel Lucey. Twenty-six scientists from the U.S., France, Germany and other nations signed an open letter discrediting the WHO mission. It was a "charade" said Richard Ebright, a Rutgers University chemical biology professor.
Truth is, Biden could care less. Last week, at the Anchorage summit, Secretary of State Antony Blinken itemized America's "deep concerns" to the Chinese. Shockingly, the virus wasn't a top priority. That's an insult to every American family that lost a loved one. Protesting persecution of the Muslim Uyghurs is no substitute for finding out why grandma had to die.
The Biden administration's failure to press for answers is dangerous. China has seen what a virus can do. As Hudson Institute fellow David Asher points out, it devastated the world's economies and killed millions. Yet, China's population was largely spared, and its economy "has roared back to be No. 1."
Why build nuclear weapons when a virus can wipe out rivals and ensure world dominance?
Biden's strategy to carve out areas of cooperation such as on climate change, while China continues to stonewall on COVID-19, sends a confusing message about what's important. Like a husband confronting his wife for cheating but then asking her where they should go on vacation.
Team Biden objects to the term "China virus, " supposedly out of concern for Asian Americans. Then let's call it the Chinese Communist Party virus, instead of that meaningless name concocted by the WHO. Getting the world to call the virus COVID-19 was a major PR triumph for WHO and China, and a blow to accountability.
It obscures who hid the initial outbreak, silenced doctors and journalists, and still refuses to tell the truth. To win a war, you must know your enemy. It's China.
Betsy McCaughey is a former lieutenant governor of New York and author of "The Next Pandemic," available at Amazon.com. Contact her at betsy@betsymccaughey.com or on Twitter @Betsy_McCaughey.
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