Fauci addresses Redfield's comments that virus 'escaped' from Wuhan lab

Dr. Anthony Fauci, a top adviser to the Biden administration on the coronavirus pandemic, addressed comments that former Centers for Disease Control and Prevention Director Dr. Robert Redfield made on Friday.

Video Transcript

ANTHONY FAUCI: OK, so when you think about the possibilities of how this virus appeared in the human population, obviously, there are a number of theories. The issue that would have someone think it's possible to have escaped from a lab would mean that it essentially entered the outside human population already well-adapted to humans, suggesting that it was adapted in the lab.

However, the alternative explanation, which most public health individuals go by, is that this virus was actually circulating in China, likely in Wuhan, for a month or more before they were clinically recognized at the end of December of 2019. If that were the case, the virus clearly could have adapted itself to a greater efficiency of transmissibility over that period of time, up to and at the time it was recognized.

So Dr. Redfield was mentioning that he was giving an opinion as to a possibility. But again, there are other alternatives, others that most people hold by.

ROCHELLE WALLENSKY: And we are looking forward to a WHO report that should be coming out soon that examines the origin of this pandemic and of SARS-CoV-2 in humans. And we'll look forward to reviewing that.