Chaos at US top medical advisor Fauci’s last press briefing over Covid origin questions

Chaos ensued at the last press briefing of US chief medical advisor Anthony Fauci at the White House after a reporter raised questions on the origins of the COVID-19 virus.

The outgoing medical advisor was speaking about the Covid response efforts by the Biden administration on Tuesday when a correspondent from the New York Post (NYP), Diana Glebova, tried to ask Fauci what he had done personally to probe the virus origins.

This soon prompted other reporters to shout similar questions at the medical chief, forcing White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre to jump in and interrupt them.

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"We have a process here…I'm not calling on people who yell and you're being disrespectful to your colleagues and you're being disrespectful to our guest. I will not call on you if you yell, and also you're taking time off the clock because Dr Faucihas to leave in a couple of minutes.”

But her efforts went in vain, as the NYP correspondent continued to press with her questions.

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"I'mdone!" Jean-Pierre retorted. "I'mnot getting into a back-and-forth with you."

The NYP journalist soon found support from her colleague, Africa Today’s Simon Ateba, who told Jean-Pierre to “allow her to ask the question … She’s asking about the origins of COVID-19, and Dr Fauci is the best person to answer that question.”

Jean-Pierre then shouted back at him, saying, “I hear the question! But we're not doing this the way you want it! This is disrespectful. I'm done. Simon, I'm done. I'm done with you right now."

This was perhaps the biggest tussle seen at a White House press conference since November 2018 witnessed between CNN correspondent Jim Acosta and then-US president Donald Trump over the asylum situation.

What is the theory of Covid origins?

Following the outbreak of Covid, several countries and the scientific community called for a probe to find the origins of the virus.

Since it was first reported in China’s Wuhan market, speculations were mainly concentrated on two possibilities: Whether the virus emerged from the animal market, or was it engineered in a virology lab, which was near the market.

In 2021, Fauci suggested that the virus may have come from the virology lab. "I am not convinced with the theory that the virus developed naturally."

"I think we should continue to investigate what went on in China until we find out to the best of our ability exactly what happened. Certainly, the people who investigated it say it was the emergence of from an animal reservoir that then infected individuals, but it could have been something else, and we need to find that out," Fauci had said.

In June this year, the World Health Organization released a report after their team went to Wuhan for inspection, saying that “key pieces of data” to explain how the pandemic began were still missing.

The scientists said the group would “remain open to any and all scientific evidence that becomes available in the future to allow for comprehensive testing of all reasonable hypotheses.”

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