Signing the Act on the Declassification of Information on the Origins of COVID-19, President Biden: We Need to Know to Prevent Future Pandemics

JAKARTA - United States President Joe Biden on Monday signed into law mandating the declassification of information related to the origins of the coronavirus that causes COVID-19, the White House said.

President Joe Biden said he has the same goal as the United States Congress, to release as much information as possible about the origins of COVID-19.

"In implementing this law, my administration will declassify and share as much of that information as possible, consistent with my constitutional authority to protect against the disclosure of information that would harm national security," President Biden said in a statement, citing Reuters March 21.

The bill passed through the Senate and House unopposed before being sent to the White House for President Biden's signature.

Washington has been known to have waged a highly politicized debate about the origins of the coronavirus pandemic since the first human cases were reported in the Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019, amid calls for President Biden's Democratic and Republican counterparts to push harder on China, who is rising.

The debate heated up again last month, when the Wall Street Journal reported that the US Department of Energy had judged that the pandemic most likely originated in a laboratory leak in China, an assessment Beijing denied.

The department made the assessment in a classified intelligence report. The FBI has also assessed that this pandemic most likely originated from a laboratory leak. Four other US agencies still judge that COVID-19 is most likely the result of natural transmission, while two more are still undecided.

In fact, many US officials say the origins of this pandemic may never be known. China says claims that laboratory leaks caused the pandemic have no credibility.

While President Biden noted he has directed intelligence agencies to investigate the origins of COVID-19 in 2021, that work is ongoing and his administration will continue to review all classified information, including potential links to the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

"We need to know the origins of COVID-19 to help ensure that we can better prevent future pandemics," said President Biden.