[namose]

You speak as if this is a bad thing. If the U.S. funded research that caused the covid outbreak, the international community should lose trust in us, especially since public officials dismissed (perhaps unfairly) theories that would have put the U.S. at fault. Obviously, this goes doubly for China.

Increasing safeguards relies on us knowing what the vectors of outbreak are. It matters if this was caused by an underpaid lab assistant selling animals that were meant to be contained, or a random person catching animals to sell, or a researcher that didn't quarantine after being bit. The safeguards should be different.