The House Appropriations Committee has put forth legislation to prevent the EcoHealth Alliance (EHA) and the Wuhan Institute of Virology from acquiring funds from the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID). The bill also restricts financial aid to either entity from sources tied to the Department of State. This groundbreaking action comes after investigative efforts to block funding to entities like EHA and laboratories associated with adversarial nations.
The White Coat Waste Project (WCW) recently published documents acquired through a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, suggesting that EHA and the Wuhan Institute were involved in research that likely resulted in the devastating COVID-19 pandemic. The catastrophic virus resulted in the deaths of over 1.1 million Americans and well over 6.9 million people worldwide.
Breaking: House spending bill bars EcoHealth Alliance and the Wuhan lab from receiving USAID funds https://t.co/b5emVLMBQd https://t.co/oqBa4Kie9i
— Millennial Conservative ™️ (@Milennial_con) June 23, 2023
The documents exposed how EHA, managed by British zoologist Peter Daszak, channeled at least $38 million in USAID funds to a project involving one of the Wuhan Institute’s so-called “patients zero.” Moreover, WCW disclosed that since the pandemic’s inception, EHA received $11 million from USAID, $26 million from the Department of Defense, and another $263,801 from the National Science Foundation. Astonishingly, since 2008, the newly acquired records show that NIH and other governmental agencies have been steadily pouring taxpayer money into EcoHealth Alliance.
The 2024 State, Foreign Operations, and Related Programs Bill places EHA in the same restrictive group as countries recognized as foreign adversaries by the Secretary of State. The drafted bill ensures that funds cannot be allocated to support:
- The Wuhan Institute of Virology, located in Wuhan, China,
- EcoHealth Alliance, Inc.,
- Any laboratories under control by governments of countries deemed as foreign adversaries, or
- Gain-of-function research.
In addition to this recent effort to block EHA from further taxpayer funding, Sen. Joni Ernst (R-IA) has announced her intention to offer amendments in the Senate to the National Defense Authorization Act. These amendments aim to disallow defense dollars from funding China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology and to cut off further payments from the Pentagon to EcoHealth. The senator also plans to launch an independent investigation to ascertain if EcoHealth diverted U.S. Defense dollars into the Wuhan Institute or any other Chinese lab or used it to create enhanced pathogens of pandemic potential.
The FBI and Energy Department have evaluated the so-called “lab leak theory” as the most plausible explanation for the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic. In light of these findings, the House bill could significantly protect U.S. taxpayers’ funds and ensure they are not funneled into institutions associated with hazardous gain-of-function research and potential global pandemics.
