The U.S. military and intelligence community are investigating the theory that the novel coronavirus may have originated from an accidental contamination from a laboratory in Wuhan, China, rather than from a wet market, as has been widely speculated.
Gen. Mark Milley, the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, confirmed to reporters on Tuesday that military intelligence was looking into it.
“On the lab piece … it should be no surprise to you that we’ve taken a keen interest in that, and we’ve had a lot of intelligence take a hard look at that,” Milley said. “And I would just say at this point that it’s inconclusive — although the weight of evidence seems to indicate natural. But we don’t know for certain.”
Josh Rogin, a columnist for the Washington Post, tweeted in response that “many senior officials disagree with Milley and believe the lab origin is much more likely than the seafood market story.”