Fact-check: Coronavirus leaked from lab?
The coronavirus pandemic has devoured thousands of human lives and infected millions of people across the world ever since it first emerged in China earlier this year.
The virus has upended livelihoods of millions of people after major cities went into lockdown as part of preventive measures against the disease. It brought world economies to a halt, leaving people stuck inside their houses.
With no remedy in sight, people are discussing many theories about how the coronavirus started.
Among many conspiracy theories, the one that “coronavirus leaked from a lab” is quite popular with internet users.
A large number of them believe that it leaked from a lab in Chinese city of Wuhan, the epicenter of the COVID-19, during a research on the disease.
While scientists and experts have come up with several studies suggesting that the virus spread from bats, some people still believe that it got leaked from a search lab.
“Most scientists agree that the virus originated in bats; one study found that it shares 96% of its genetic code with coronaviruses circulating in Chinese bat populations. Experts have suggested that an intermediary animal species may have passed it to people in a wet market in the city of Wuhan in December. But a growing body of evidence shows coronavirus infections were spreading in the city before the cluster of cases linked to the market arose,” stated a report by Business Insider.
All the theories that coronavirus leaked from a lab are unsubstantiated, according to experts.