NOT REAL NEWS: A look at what didn't happen this week
A roundup of some of the most popular but completely untrue stories and visuals of the week. None of these are legit, even though they were shared widely on social media. The Associated Press checked them out. Here are the facts:
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Biden didn’t reinstate funding for a Wuhan virus lab
CLAIM: President Joe Biden restored taxpayer funding for the Wuhan Institute of Virology.
THE FACTS: Social media users are falsely claiming the Biden administration is bankrolling the Wuhan Institute of Virology, a Chinese lab that has faced unproven allegations that the coronavirus leaked from the facility, leading to the global COVID-19 pandemic. “Biden not sending out COVID relief checks… but refunding the Wuhan lab where COVID came from is THE PERFECT EXAMPLE of America last,” read a screenshot of a Twitter post shared on Instagram. “Voila — U.S. taxpayer money was returned to the Wuhan Institute of Virology,” a Washington Times opinion piece stated. The claims seemed to originate with distortions of an article on the conservative news website The Daily Caller, which claimed the lab was eligible to receive U.S. taxpayer funding until 2024. The article never said the lab was currently grant funded. It’s true that the Wuhan Institute of Virology has fulfilled one requirement that animal research facilities outside the U.S. need to receive a NIH grant: foreign assurance approval. This assurance issued by the NIH Office of Laboratory Welfare confirms that the lab complies with certain guidelines on the humane care and use of laboratory animals. The institute’s foreign assurance was issued in 2019 and expires in 2024, the NIH told The Associated Press. However, foreign assurance is just one requirement and “does not determine whether an organization can or will receive a grant award or subaward,” according to the...
