Transcript segment

Baric Transcribed Interview (Redacted), p.33 · baric_ti:utt:00198

Date: 2026-04-10 09:00 (day precision)
Type: transcript segment · interview
recipient: Christina Salazar, Harry Kazenoff, David T. Lambeth III, William Henderson, Clark Ervin, Jake Greenberg
speaker: Ralph S. Baric
Topics: Intelligence community assessments Wuhan Institute of Virology collaboration

Initially it came from the Chinese, social media speculation about what was the cause of the pandemic. The question certainly came up, and I can tell you the same thing that I told them, as far as this virus differs from the SARS coronavirus-2 strain by over 6,000 nucleotides, which means that it's incredibly different. So there's no way it could ever be associated with the emergence of this virus. It's just not possible. Same thing with the WIV1 virus. That's been validated by I don't know how many independent investigators around the globe. When they compare the sequence they say it is not the cause of the pandemic.

Extracted statements

Rule-extracted, not adjudicated. The grade says what may be done with each one; read the document above before relying on any of them.

Statement	Grade	Attribution	Stance
Initially it came from the Chinese, social media speculation about what was the cause of the pandemic.	own voice, substantive	speaker_own	asserts
So there's no way it could ever be associated with the emergence of this virus.	own voice, substantive	speaker_own	asserts

Statement

Grade

Attribution

Stance

Initially it came from the Chinese, social media speculation about what was the cause of the pandemic.

own voice, substantive

speaker_own

asserts

So there's no way it could ever be associated with the emergence of this virus.

own voice, substantive

speaker_own

asserts

In context

A single line often inverts meaning once you see what it answers, so neighbouring messages are always shown.

2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open

Well -- DC.Scheduling@LexitasLegal.com
2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open

That's just my commentary.
2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open

I would guess that most large organizations will take a while to find the paperwork.
2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open

So they asked you to provide the paperwork. I mean, did you alert them that this was an accusation that it could have been the 2015 virus? You know, where did that come from?
2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric

Initially it came from the Chinese, social media speculation about what was the cause of the pandemic. The question certainly came up, and I can tell you the same thing that I told them, as far as this virus differs from the SARS coronavirus-2 strain by over 6,000 nucleotides, which means that it's incredibly different. So there's no way it could ever be associated with the emergence of this virus. It's just not possible. Same thing with the WIV1 virus. That's been validated by I don't know how many independent investigators around the globe. When they compare the sequence they say it is not the cause of the pandemic.
2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open

Okay. So what else was discussed in the meeting?
2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open

We discussed the P3CO documents. I sort of told them why we felt that the data didn't demonstrate a gain-of-function phenotype, and that was because there was no change or increased replication of the virus in human DC.Scheduling@LexitasLegal.com cells. There was no increased pathogenesis in mice. Alternatively, there was a loss of disease severity in mice, and so that's a loss-of-function phenotype.
2026-04-10 09:00 Christina Salazar open

And who made those decisions from NIH?
2026-04-10 09:00 Ralph S. Baric open

Well, again, my job is to send the document to the NIH. It goes into a black box.

Full conversation →