CIA now says COVID most likely originated from a lab leak but has “low confidence” in its assessment

The CIA now believes the virus responsible for the COVID-19 pandemic most likely originated from a laboratory, according to an assessment released Saturday that points the finger at China even while acknowledging that the spy agency has “low confidence” in its own conclusion.

The finding is not the result of any new intelligence, and the report was completed at the behest of the Biden administration and former CIA director William Burns. It was declassified and released Saturday on the orders of President Trump’s pick to lead the agency, John Ratcliffe, who was sworn in Thursday as director.

“CIA assesses with low confidence that a research-related origin of the COVID-19 pandemic is more likely than a natural origin based on the available body of reporting. CIA continues to assess that both research-related and natural origin scenarios of the COVID-19 pandemic remain plausible,” a spokesperson for the agency said in a statement, noting they “will continue to evaluate any available credible new intelligence reporting or open-source information that could change CIA’s assessment.”

Jake Sullivan, the Biden administration national security adviser, ordered a classified review in December of U.S. intelligence that had been gathered on the origins of COVID-19, one current and one former U.S. official confirmed to CBS News. Sullivan convened a panel of outside experts to assess the intelligence and asked the intelligence community to review its data and form a conclusion. Both officials told CBS News there was no new “smoking gun,” but rather a low-confidence assessment based on the same data. Burns ordered the review before leaving the CIA, citing high policymaker interest.

The nuanced finding suggests the agency believes the totality of evidence makes a lab origin more likely than a natural origin. But the agency’s assessment assigns a low degree of confidence to this conclusion, suggesting the evidence is deficient, inconclusive or contradictory.

Earlier reports on the origins of COVID-19 have split over whether the coronavirus emerged from a Chinese lab, potentially by mistake, or whether it arose naturally. The new assessment is not likely to settle the debate. In fact, intelligence officials say it may never be resolved, due to a lack of cooperation from Chinese authorities.

Instead of new evidence, the conclusion was based on fresh analyses of intelligence about the spread of the virus, its scientific properties and the work and conditions of China’s virology labs.

Lawmakers have pressured America’s spy agencies for more information about the origins of the virus, which led to lockdowns, economic upheaval and millions of deaths. It’s a question with significant domestic and geopolitical implications as the world continues to grapple with the pandemic’s legacy.

Republican Sen. Tom Cotton of Arkansas, chairman of the Senate Intelligence Committee, said Saturday he was “pleased the CIA concluded in the final days of the Biden administration that the lab-leak theory is the most plausible explanation” and he commended Ratcliffe for declassifying the assessment.

“Now, the most important thing is to make China pay for unleashing a plague on the world,” Cotton said in a statement.

Chinese authorities have dismissed speculation about COVID’s origins as unhelpful and motivated by politics. On Saturday, a spokesperson for China’s U.S. embassy said the CIA report has no credibility.

“We firmly oppose the politicization and stigmatization of the source of the virus, and once again call on everyone to respect science and stay away from conspiracy theories,” embassy spokesperson Liu Pengyu said in a statement emailed to The Associated Press.

While the origin of the virus remains unknown, scientists think the most likely hypothesis is that it circulated in bats, like many coronaviruses, before infecting another species, probably raccoon dogs, civet cats or bamboo rats. In turn, the infection spread to humans handling or butchering those animals at a market in Wuhan, where the first human cases appeared in late November 2019.

Some official investigations, however, have raised the question of whether the virus escaped from a lab in Wuhan. Two years ago a report by the Energy Department concluded a lab leak was the most likely origin, though that report also expressed low confidence in the finding.

The same year then-FBI Director Christopher Wray said his agency believed the virus “most likely” spread after escaping from a lab.

Ratcliffe, who served as director of national intelligence during Trump’s first term, has said he favors the lab leak scenario, too.

“The lab leak is the only theory supported by science, intelligence, and common sense,” Ratcliffe said in 2023.

The CIA said it will continue to evaluate any new information that could change its assessment.

Margaret Brennan

contributed to this report.