EcoHealth Alliance president to testify on COVID origins, Wuhan lab taxpayer-funded research

EcoHealth Alliance President Peter Daszak is expected to publically attest connected Wednesday earlier the House Select Subcommittee connected the Coronavirus Pandemic.

According to legislature lawmakers, EcoHealth – a U.S.-based nonprofit whose ngo is to forestall pandemics – utilized payer dollars "to money unsafe gain-of-function research astatine the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV)" successful China.

COVID ORIGINS: ECOHEALTH ALLIANCE PRESIDENT TO TESTIFY PUBLICLY BEFORE CONGRESS NEXT MONTH

Committee Chair Brad Wenstrup, R-Ohio, is acceptable to pb the hearing, but House Oversight Committee Chair James Comer, R-Ky., House Energy and Commerce Committee Chair Cathy McMorris Rodgers, R-Wash., House Subcommittee connected Oversight and Investigations Chair Morgan Griffith, R-Va., and House Subcommittee connected Health Chair Brett Guthrie, R-Ky., are besides expected to be to inquire questions of Daszak.

Peter Daszak, right, Thea Fischer, left, and different members of the World Health Organization squad investigating the origins of the COVID-19 coronavirus get astatine the Wuhan Institute of Virology successful Wuhan, China, connected Feb. 3, 2021. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

The proceeding is expected to statesman astatine 10 a.m.

Daszak testified down closed doors successful November, but House Republicans said his grounds contained galore "discrepancies," according to a missive from Wenstrup and different GOP committee chairs sent to Daszak past month.

"These revelations undermine your credibility arsenic good arsenic each factual assertion you made during your transcribed interview," Wenstrup and the others wrote. "The Committees person a close and an work to support the integrity of their investigations, including the accuracy of grounds during a transcribed interview. We invitation you to close the record." 

FBI DIRECTOR SAYS COVID PANDEMIC 'MOST LIKELY' ORIGINATED FROM CHINESE LAB

Lawmakers are calling connected Daszak to code the discrepancies successful his grounds and publically explicate EcoHealth’s narration with the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Lawmakers besides said the discrepancies rise "serious questions astir the veracity of EcoHealth’s nationalist statements, including their insistence that the probe they funded astatine the WIV could not person caused the pandemic." 

Security unit basal extracurricular the Wuhan Institute of Virology successful Wuhan, China, connected Feb. 3, 2021. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

But Daszak's nationalist proceeding is of involvement to lawmakers connected some sides of the aisle.

A spokesperson for Democrats connected the COVID subcommittee told Fox News Digital that passim the Congress, they person "underscored the value of pursuing and prioritizing forward-looking reforms that heighten biosafety standards successful the United States and astir the globe truthful that we tin trim the menace of aboriginal outbreaks and forestall aboriginal pandemics."

"In the Select Subcommittee’s probe of federally funded research, grounds and documents reviewed by Select Subcommittee Democrats rise superior concerns that EcoHealth Alliance disregarded national reporting requirements that guarantee grantees are accountable to the American people," the spokesperson told Fox News Digital. "We look guardant to Dr. Daszak’s grounds earlier the Select Subcommittee connected this matter."

Fox News Digital antecedently reported that EcoHealth Alliance received millions of dollars successful grants from the National Institutes of Health (NIH). U.S. payer funds flowed to Chinese entities conducting coronavirus probe done EcoHealth Alliance.

This presumption shows the P4 laboratory, halfway left, astatine the Wuhan Institute of Virology successful Wuhan, China, connected May 27, 2020. (Hector Retamal/AFP via Getty Images)

That wealth – astatine slightest $600,000 – was redirected to the Wuhan Institute of Virology and went toward probe to measure the transmission of bat coronaviruses to humans. The probe included conducting RNA extractions and DNA sequencing connected bat samples arsenic good arsenic biologic experiments connected pathogen spillover from bats to humans. 

EcoHealth Alliance besides received much than $200,000 that was redirected to Wuhan University and went toward illness surveillance probe activities, including postulation of biologic samples from radical successful China with precocious levels of vulnerability to bats for Wuhan Institute of Virology to behaviour further screening.

Former U.S. authorities officials, similar erstwhile NIH Director Francis Collins, said the U.S. payer wealth was not approved to behaviour gain-of-function research, which is probe that involves modifying a microorganism to marque it much infectious among humans.

"Dr. Daszak’s closed-door grounds raised superior concerns astir EcoHealth Alliance’s narration with the Wuhan Institute of Virology," Wenstrup told Fox News Digital successful a statement. "Even aft the Select Subcommittee reminded Dr. Daszak that helium could beryllium taxable to transgression prosecution if helium lied to the Committees, Dr. Daszak made galore claims that seemed to beryllium inconsistent with extracurricular grounds and erstwhile revelations." 

CLICK HERE TO GET THE FOX NEWS APP

"We are looking guardant to an honorable forum wherever the American radical tin perceive straight from the President of EcoHealth Alliance and yet person the answers astir the origins of COVID-19 that they deserve," Wenstrup said.

The U.S. Energy Department and the FBI person determined that COVID-19 apt emerged from a laboratory leak successful China.