Sen. Ernst wants Congress to halt funding Wuhan-linked non-profit

A controversial Manhattan non-profit that worked with the Chinese lab linked to the coronavirus pandemic continues to receive millions in grants from the US government to do research on viruses, according to a US senator.

Joni Ernst, a Republican Senator from Iowa, called on Congress to stop giving out grants to EcoHealth Alliance for “dangerous” new projects. The firm previously received millions in grants, with some of those funds directed to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which has been at the center of fierce debates about the origins of the coronavirus pandemic.

“We really need to understand what they were doing [in Wuhan],” Ernst told The Sun this week. “And certainly if they are going to continue with dangerous experiments, federal taxpayer dollars shouldn’t be going to this.”

Last year, EcoHealth Alliance received a $653,392 grant from the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases — the first installment of a five-year award totaling $3.3 million. The cash was doled out the same day that NIAID, then headed by controversial virologist Anthony Fauci, awarded the firm more than $2.1 million for two more ongoing studies, one of which involves so-called “gain-of-function” to make viruses more dangerous.

Fauci has come under intense scrutiny for his policies during the COVID-19 pandemic.

Previously released emails documented a close relationship between EcoHealth Alliance president Peter Daszak and Fauci, who received a “personal thank you” from the EcoHealth chief in April 2020 for backing the theory that COVID-19 spread naturally from bats to humans.

Current EcoHealth Alliance projects include experiments with bats on the Nipah virus in Bangladesh as well as research into viruses in Thailand, Singapore and Malaysia.