Washington.- In the spring of 2021, when studies on the origins of the coronavirus pandemic were going nowhere and the issue was embroiled in bitter partisan politics, David Relman, a Stanford microbiologist, made a silent request to his congressman.
He told his representative, Anna Eshoo, that he was organizing a letter from leading scientists calling for an open and independent investigation into the origins of Covid-19, even if it came from a laboratory in Wuhan, China. She wanted to know if she would publicly endorse the idea.
The scope worked. As soon as the letter appeared online in the prestigious journal Science, Eshoo became one of the first Democrats in Congress to call for an investigation into the origins of Covid.
It was the prelude to a sweeping political shift on the issue: Within weeks, President Biden ordered a top-down intelligence review of how the pandemic began, which has since reached mixed conclusions.
The story of the search for the origin of Covid is in part about the obstruction of China that has left scientists with incomplete evidence, all about a virus that is constantly changing. Despite all the data suggesting the virus may have jumped to people from wild animals at a Chinese market, conclusive proof remains out of reach, as does the hypothesis that the virus leaked from a laboratory.
But the story is also about politics and how both Democrats and Republicans have filtered available evidence through their partisan lenses.
Some Republicans became obsessed with the idea of a lab leak after former President Donald J. Trump raised it in the early months of the pandemic despite scant supporting evidence. That made the theory toxic to many Democrats, who saw it as an effort by Trump to divert attention from his administration’s failures to contain the spread of the virus.
The intense political debate, now in its fourth year, has at times turned scientists into lobbyists, vying for politicians’ time and favor. Dr. Relman is just one of several researchers and like-minded thinkers who have successfully worked in the corridors of power in Washington to force skeptical journalists, lawmakers, and Democrats to take the idea of the lab leak seriously.
But the political momentum hasn’t always lined up with the evidence. Even as the idea of an accidental lab leak has now gained traction in Washington, the findings reported last week bolstered the market theory. Mining a trove of genetic data taken from swabs at the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in Wuhan in early 2020, virus experts said they found samples containing genetic material from both the coronavirus and illegally traded raccoon dogs. The finding, though hardly conclusive, pointed to an infected animal.
New market data suggests China is latching on to clues that could reshape the debate. But for now, at least, the idea of a lab leak seems to have prevailed in the court of public opinion: Two recent polls show that roughly two-thirds of Americans believe that Covid probably started in a lab.
