CIA now says COVID-19 'more likely' to have come from lab

[BumRushDaShow]

Source: USA Today

Published 2:57 p.m. ET Jan. 25, 2025


NEW YORK - The Central Intelligence Agency has assessed that the COVID-19 pandemic is "more likely" to have emerged from a lab rather than from nature, an agency spokesperson said on Saturday.

The agency had for years said it could not conclude whether COVID-19 was the result of a lab incident or it originated in nature.

The CIA says it has "low confidence" in its assessment that a "research-related origin of the COVID-19 pandemic is more likely" and notes in its statement that both scenarios - lab origin and natural origin - remain plausible. The Chinese embassy in Washington did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

It was unclear the extent to which the agency has collected new intelligence on COVID-19's origins and whether that new evidence was used to formulate the latest assessment.

Read more: https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2025/01/25/cia-now-says-covid-19-more-likely-to-have-come-from-lab/77947876007/

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Of course they did.

[dchill]

1. - Truthbender John Ratcliffe has sway.

[wolfie001]

2. Of course, they'll say their sources and evidence are secret/classified

This is an Alex Jones Administration at this point. Nixon's "Enemies List" is quite quaint at this point.

[The Madcap]

3. Nope

Why should I trust anything they say now?

[stopdiggin]

4. that was kind of my take on the 'new assessment' as well

But, thanks for posting in any event ...

[ForPeace]

5. Low confidence

At least they said that! Many will read the headline and believe it, but low confidence means they unsure of the validity.

[LudwigPastorius]

6. "CIA now says COVID-19 'more likely' to have come from lab"

...just days after Trump takes office and orders them to say that.

What a coincidence.

[rickford66]

7. "low confidence" equals "more likely"

[Shipwack]

12. Maybe the odds went from 5% to 7%...

They still have low confidence that this is true, but it’s slightly more possible than it was before?

They’re trying to maintain a bit of dignity while they suck up to the new regime.

[Xipe Totec]

15. Maybe the odds went from 5% to Holy shit, Trump's in power! nt

[Igel]

18. Think of it as on an x-y plane.

One axis says how reliable your data are.

The other axis says what the data say.

Think of this as the spatial equivalent of "intersectional", with only two parameters.

You can have rock-solid data that really doesn't answer the question one way or the other. Or you can have weak data that points clearly in one direction. Sometimes weak data are all you have, and "weak" doesn't mean "wrong." Just you can't trust them to be right (or wrong).

The IPCC reports are the same way. If you don't report *both* bits of information I think it properly counts as misinformation, and very few news sources report both bits.

Always remembering that even the evaluation of the data as low or high confidence has confidence intervals associated with it.

[rickford66]

19. The Rumsfeld dilemma ?

[milestogo]

8. What would they know about it?

Are they suddenly virologists?

[PSPS]

13. There are experts in viral genealogy who proved it was not a lab variant shortly after it emerged.

This is just an early example of trump's loyalists and yesmen in charge and doing his bidding. So far, he has muzzled all of the real health-related government agencies, leaving the only "alternate facts" being spoken.

[milestogo]

9. BLAME DR FAUCI! BLAME THE CHINESE!

[camartinwv]

10. Interesting timing

[yonder]

11. Interesting how the NIH, CDC and FDA have now been uncharacteristically prohibited

from sharing information or making statements regarding public health concerns, while the CIA has apparently been given a megaphone to do quite the opposite.

It looks like those aspects of their charters have been exactly reversed. Everything is turning backwards, inside out or upside down.

P2025, up and running but not full steam. Yet.

[Trueblue Texan]

14. Gaslighting or reality? You decide. nt

[twodogsbarking]

16. Sounds like they know where it came from.

But it wasn't a Chinese lab leak.

[StarryNite]

17. Sounds like they got their marching orders from the felon.