The Latest Breaking News from Wuhan

China said the Wuhan lab leak virus theory was ‘extremely unlikely’

Trump believes the COVID-19 pandemic started from a research lab in Wuhan, China.

Five years ago, on March 11, 2020, the World Health Organization declared the outbreak of COVID-19 a global pandemic. The novel coronavirus, dubbed SARS-CoV-2, began as a “cluster of severe pneumonia cases of unknown cause” reported in Wuhan, China, in December 2019. It had spread to 118,000 cases reported in…

In a January 24 interview with the far-right-wing outlet Breitbart News, newly appointed CIA director John Ratcliffe stated that assessing intelligence on a potential Wuhan lab leak was a top priority. The following day, The New York Times reported that the agency had shifted from an undecided stance to favoring a…

The potential for human infection has yet to be explored

There remains many open questions about whether the agency's funding played a role in the creation of COVID-19 in a Wuhan laboratory.

The CIA now considers a lab leak the most likely origin of COVID-19 but holds "low confidence" in the theory.

CIA investigates Covid-19 lab leak theory in China. Assessment points to Wuhan lab incident as likely cause. Significant shift in CIA's position.

Built in just days as Covid-19 cases spiked in Wuhan in early 2020, the Huoshenshan Hospital was once celebrated as a symbol of the Chinese city's fight against the virus that first emerged there.

Whether Covid-19 was unleashed by a laboratory mishap or spilled over from animals remains an enduring, fiercely contested mystery.

Five years after the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, the United Nations’ health organisation has called on China to share data to understand how it began.