Exclusive: New FOIA Email Suggests Fauci’s NIAID Collaborated with China’s PLA on Covid Vaccine

By Hans Mahncke & Jeff Carlson

As new Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) email suggests that Anthony Fauci’s National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID) collaborated with China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) on the development of a coronavirus vaccine. The email, which is addressed to Fauci, is from Peter Hotez, a Fauci-funded scientist at Baylor College of Medicine. Hotez is known for his fanatical advocacy of the natural origin theory for Covid.

The email is part of a 305-page bundle released by NIAID’s parent organization, the National Institutes of Health (NIH), pursuant to a FOIA request by independent journalist Jimmy Tobias. 

Although most of the email has been redacted by NIH censors, the subject line remains visible and it provides a strong clue that Fauci’s NIAID was directly involved in a pre-pandemic PLA project to create a coronavirus vaccine.

The subject line, "Our NIAID supported SARS receptor binding domain vaccine (from China)", is notable because it seems to imply that NIAID had successfully developed a SARS vaccine in China. SARS stands for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome and refers to the subcategory of coronaviruses to which Covid belongs. While it was known that both Hotez and Peter Daszak's EcoHealth Alliance had received NIAID funding to conduct experiments in China with the ostensible purpose of developing vaccines, it was not known that a NIAID project had led to the development of such a vaccine.

Hotez's email, dated January 20, 2020, further states that the new vaccine "underwent cGMP manufacture". cGMP refers to the Current Good Manufacturing Practice regulations enforced by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA). These regulations pertain to quality control in the pharmaceutical industry. In other words, it appears that Fauci's organization not only funded the development of a SARS vaccine in China but also that the process had progressed to the manufacturing stage.

While there is no indication that Daszak’s grant ever led to the development of anything—other than extremely dangerous viruses which might leak from Chinese labs—Hotez’s grant may have ended up aiding the PLA in creating biodefense countermeasures, such as a SARS vaccine.

In 2015, Fauci had given Hotez a $1.2 million grant to develop a SARS vaccine to counteract “possible zoonotic reintroduction of SARS-CoV into humans, accidental release from a laboratory or deliberate spreading of the virus by a bioterrorist attack.” In other words, Fauci had foreseen the possibility of a lab leak, the same thing he later claimed was not possible.

Notably, Hotez’s grant was co-awarded to Jiang Shibo, a researcher at China’s Fudan University. Jiang had close ties to the Wuhan Institute of Virology’s (WIV) director, Shi Zhengli. Aside from conducting studies together, they can also be seen sitting next to each other in a 2018 photo taken at the WIV. The same photo also features a number of Fauci-funded scientists who had set out to create Covid-like viruses under the DEFUSE proposal.

While it is not known whether Jiang succeeded in developing a SARS vaccine, Zhou Yusen, a PLA scientist who worked at the WIV, claimed to have created such a vaccine. In fact, in February 2020, Zhou became the first person to report developing a Covid vaccine. The timeline, which closely followed the emergence of Covid, always suggested that Zhou had a head start. This could be due to his involvement in the creation of Covid or because he learned about the Wuhan lab leak early on. The fact that Zhou died shortly after announcing his vaccine, apparently by falling off the roof of the WIV, only adds to the suspicion. 

Significantly, Zhou was a co-author of five studies that emanated from Hotez’s Fauci grant, i.e. the grant that tasked Hotez with making SARS vaccines in China. All five Zhou studies acknowledge that they were completed using Hotez’s NIAID grant from Fauci. This presents not only a direct link between Hotez and Zhou but also a link between Fauci and Zhou. 

Thus, there is a strong suggestion that when Hotez emailed Fauci on January 20, 2020, which was before the public even knew that there was a pandemic on the horizon, he was referencing the vaccine that had been developed by Zhou, supposedly with the aid of NIAID funds. What is beyond doubt, given Zhou’s repeated acknowledgments referencing the Fauci grant, is that US taxpayer funds were used to subsidize PLA biodefense research.

It is now up to Congress to compel NIH censors to disclose what is concealed behind the heavily redacted portion of Hotez's email, as well as to investigate for additional emails in this email chain. For instance, it is unknown whether Fauci replied to Hotez. Fauci forwarded Hotez's email to Hilary Marston, the head of pandemic preparedness at NIAID. Notably, Fauci sent Marston a copy of a study by Shi Zhengli, which was co-authored by Jiang, the Fauci-funded collaborator of Hotez. This appears to once again prove that Fauci was well aware of who Shi was, something he has repeatedly denied under oath.