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As the novel coronavirus rages through the world’s nations, many people have begun to suspect that some organizations aren’t telling the full story. In the US, a vocal minority has begun to speculate that the World Health Organization is withholding information. Some variations of this conspiracy theory hold that the WHO is collaborating with China in an effort to cover up the virus’s origins.
This line of thought has even come from the president of the US. Donald Trump stopped funding to the WHO in mid-April, citing the need for an investigation into the agency. Trump also insists that China is somehow to blame for the virus. Reports say that Bill Gates, owner of Microsoft, is also somehow involved.
The WHO, the Wuhan Institute of Virology and the Gates Foundation were all recently targeted in a hacking attack. Passwords, emails and other important information were all dropped onto the internet by the hackers. The remote computer access was likely in connection to conspiracy theories that these institutions are hiding something from the public.
The hack, critically, also leaked thousands of documents to the internet. Early reports from these readings hold that a Dr. Zhengli Shi may have purposefully loosed the virus onto the populace. The theory comes from documents in the hack. The documents allege that CCTV camera caught Shi placing dry ice near an air vent.
The air vent in question was in a fish market in Wuhan, China. The event is said to have occurred on October 19, 2019. This was shortly before officials identified the first cases of COVID-19. However, the CCTV footage is not in the hack, and reliable sources have yet to scan the documents for a more thorough reading.
The unconfirmed conspiracy theory held by some online activists is that China, somehow, had a hand in the COVID-19 pandemic. This theory holds that the virus did not naturally jump from bats or pangolins to humans. The virus is not organic. Conspiracy theorists think someone engineered it.
The reasoning for this is not evident in the theory. Some theorists contend that this would be part of a plot to create a bioweapon. However, others insist it is to simply create mass confusion and panic in the world. However, there is no evidence to support this theory. In fact, scientists have determined that COVID-19 appears natural in origin.
