Overview
- Marty Makary made the accusation on the Pod Force One podcast on Wednesday, claiming Anthony Fauci suppressed early scrutiny of a possible Wuhan lab origin.
- Makary alleged Fauci steered scientific messaging by commissioning work to discredit the lab-leak hypothesis, pointing to the Proximal Origin paper.
- House Oversight documents released in 2023 confirmed Fauci requested, reviewed, and approved that paper, which he later cited at a White House briefing with President Trump.
- Makary asserted some scientists initially raised lab-leak concerns to Fauci, then published the opposite after receiving substantial funding from his agency.
- He also accused Fauci and Francis Collins of weakening gain-of-function safeguards and noted Fauci received a broad presidential pardon last December.