The theory pushed by Trump that the coronavirus began at a laboratory in Wuhan is 'pure fabrication,' according to the lab's director

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The Trump administration has pushed the theory that the coronavirus began at a laboratory in Wuhan.
Both Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo claim there is evidence supporting the claim.
However, the lab's director has this weekend described it as "pure fabrication," ABC News has reported.
We didn't even know about the existence of the virus, so how could it be leaked from our lab when we didn't have it?" Wang Yanyi told Chinese state media.
There is currently no public evidence that the COVID-19 pandemic originated in the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

The theory pushed by the Trump administration and others that the coronavirus originated in a laboratory in the Chinese city of Wuhan is "pure fabrication," the laboratory's director has said.

Wang Yanyi, director at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, told Chinese state media on Sunday that the laboratory did not have any knowledge of the COVID-19 virus before the outbreak in China and worldwide, in comments reported by ABC News.

President Donald Trump, at the end of last month, told reporters in Washington he had seen evidence showing that the virus originated in the lab, but that he was "not allowed" to provide any further details.

US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo supported President Trump days later, claiming at the beginning of this month that there was "enormous evidence" that COVID-19 originated in a laboratory in Wuhan.

Pompeo said: "We have said from the beginning, this virus originated in Wuhan, China. We took a lot of grief for that from the outset."

"But I think the whole world can see now.

"Remember, China has a history of infecting the world and they have a history of running sub-standard laboratories. These aren't the first times that we have had the world exposed to viruses as a result of failures from a Chinese lab."