The US is closing in on 700,000 cases of COVID-19 as Americans look forward to another weekend... (at home). The current number stands at about 687,000 according to Johns Hopkins University, and more than 32,000 Americans have died.
China just recently revised its numbers, adding 1,290 to the city of Wuhan's death toll, the New York Times reported. However, some experts say China's actual numbers are likely still much higher - as are numbers in other countries... Which brings us back to the uncertainty surrounding the virus, and the world pandemic that has come from it.
What are the actual numbers? And where did the virus actually come from???
In order to finally get these answers, the U.S. is now conducting a full-scale investigation into where the novel coronavirus started, and how it spread from there. According to Fox News, intelligence analysts are looking into the Wuahn lab specifically.
“We know that the first sightings of this occurred within miles of the Wuhan Institute of Virology. We know that this – the history of the facility, the first BSL-4 lab where there’s high-end virus research being conducted, took place at that site,” Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said. “And most importantly, we know they’ve not permitted the world’s scientists to go into that laboratory to evaluate what took place there, what’s happening there, what’s happening there even as we speak."
Analysts across the world have been speculating that the virus originated in a Chinese lab for months now... Back in February, the South China University of Technology conducted a study that concluded “in addition to origins of natural recombination and intermediate host, the killer coronavirus probably originated from a laboratory in Wuhan."
"The head of the WHO has stated many times that there is no evidence that the new coronavirus originated in the laboratory," China's spokesperson Zhao Lijian said during Thursday's press briefing. "Many prominent medical experts in the world also believe that the so-called laboratory leaks have no scientific basis."
There's no word yet on how long the investigation will take, but we'll keep you updated.
Read the full report on Fox News.