Bowling Green Today

WASHINGTON, D.C. – U.S. Senator Rand Paul (R-KY) has taken a stand against several federal agencies for their involvement in and awareness of the DEFUSE project, a 2018 grant proposal that aimed to manipulate viruses and create a chimeric virus similar to COVID-19. Senator Paul, the Ranking Member of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, sent letters to these agencies seeking more information on their knowledge of the project.

According to Senator Paul, "At least 15 federal agencies knew from the beginning of the pandemic that EcoHealth Alliance and the Wuhan Institute of Virology were seeking federal funding in 2018 to create a virus genetically very similar if not identical to COVID-19." He expressed his concern, stating, "Disturbingly, not one of these 15 agencies spoke up to warn us that the Wuhan Institute of Virology had been pitching this research."

The DEFUSE project, submitted to the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) under the PREventing Emerging Pathogenic Threats (PREEMPT) program, involved inserting a furin cleavage site into a coronavirus to create a novel chimeric virus. It was not disclosed to the public until 2021, despite the knowledge of these federal agencies since 2018.

Senator Paul highlighted the involvement of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) Rocky Laboratory in the DEFUSE proposal alongside the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a detail that had not been previously disclosed. He emphasized that the failure of these agencies to disclose their awareness of such risky research raises serious concerns.

In response, Senator Paul has requested the fifteen federal agencies to provide all documents, records, and communications related to the PREEMPT Proposers Day and the DEFUSE project. This call for transparency aims to shed light on the extent of knowledge and involvement of these agencies in the controversial research initiative.