US government bans Wuhan lab from federal funding

The Biden administration has banned the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) in China from receiving US federal funding after concluding that research there that had been financed by the US National Institutes of Health (NIH) likely violated biosafety protocols. Earlier this month, the NIH’s parent agency the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) determined that ‘the immediate suspension of WIV is necessary to mitigate any potential public health risk’.

WIV has been at the centre of unproven claims that the virus that caused the Covid-19 pandemic escaped from its labs. This latest development exacerbates the drama surrounding the US government’s support of coronavirus research in China prior to the outbreak.