The State Department Did Not Prove That COVID-19 is a Bioweapon
The Claim
The U.S. State Department has unearthed a secret document authored by the Chinese Government that reveals that coronavirus is a bioweapon.
News posted on
Emerging story
Throughout this month, a range of conspiracy theory websites have been claiming that the U.S. government has uncovered the origins of coronavirus. They claim that the Department of State has obtained a document authored by a range of Chinese authorities. This document, which dates to 2015, supposedly revealed that Chinese military scientists had been developing a bioweapon that spread through the air. The alleged purpose of this bioweapon was to initiate World War Three.
Shortly after this document appeared, a range of users on social media began posting about that coronavirus is a bioweapon. These posts have received thousands of interactions.
Misbar’s Analysis
Misbar’s investigation has concluded that no such document exists, and these claims are based on a book about SARS, which does not mention coronavirus. There are numerous other falsehoods and half truths that led to this conspiracy theory.
The source for this conspiracy theory is an article that appeared on the news website The Australian on May 8th, 2021. This original article was then reposted on a range of other Australian news websites. The story also appeared on unreliable U.S. sites, such as Newsmax. These sources stated that the document was leaked from the Chinese government or obtained by the U.S. Department of State.
It is incorrect to state that this document was either leaked or obtained by the U.S. Department of State or any other department of any government. That is because the alleged document is based on a book that has been publicly available in China since 2015. The book, whose title translates to The Unnatural Origin of SARS and New Species of Man-Made Viruses as Genetic Bioweapons is the result of Chinese researchers who were working on the theory that the SARS virus had been introduced to China via an enemy government. As the The Sydney Morning Herald states, this theory was proved false in 2017.
It is also worth noting that the original article in The Australian has been criticized in numerous respected publications. These sources have all condemned the article for misrepresenting the book by calling it a confidential item. It is publicly available and its contents have been disproven; it is also unrelated to coronavirus.
