A new Rasmussen Reports poll Tuesday finds that most voters are "not surprised" to learn the COVID-19 pandemic "likely" came from a leak at the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China.
From the survey, 67% of voters already believed the pandemic started in the Chinese laboratory before the U.S. Department of Energy's report last week on the origin of COVID-19 found the lab leak theory "likely."
Last week, the DOE's classified report to the White House and members of Congress concluded that the COVID-19 virus most likely began in the Wuhan lab before spreading across the globe killing millions of people, the Wall Street Journal reported Feb. 26.
That agency joins the FBI in concluding the Chinese lab's role in the pandemic.
Also, just 20% of those surveyed said they were "surprised" by the finding in the report, and another 13% said they were "not sure," according to the poll.
The poll of 1,000 likely U.S. voters was conducted by Pulse Opinion Research on March 1-2, and 5, and had a margin of error of 3 percentage points.
Of those surveyed, 48%, also said they believed that it was "very likely" at least "some" U.S. officials were involved in a "coverup" of China’s role in the pandemic, with another 17% believing it was "somewhat likely."
Twenty-eight percent said it was not "very likely," or "not at all likely" officials tried to cover up the origin of the virus and Chinese involvement.
And 7% said they were not sure, according to the poll.
A 37% plurality of voters said U.S. public health officials did a "poor" job of responding to the pandemic, and 18% gave the government a "fair" rating — while 43% rated the response as either "excellent" [16%], or "good" [27%].
According to the poll, 56% of Republicans and 40% of unaffiliated voters ranked the response to the pandemic as "poor," compared to 30% of Democrats characterizing the response as "excellent," or 37% saying it was "good."
Among unaffiliated voters, 33% of surveygoers ranked the response as either "excellent" [8%], or "good" [25%].
Also, nearly half of those voters (49%) believed masks were ineffective against the virus before recent reporting, compared to 35% being surprised to learn the new information, and 16% who remain "unsure."
Regarding Democrats, 54% said they were "surprised" to learn masks were not effective compared to 24% of Republicans and 26% of unaffiliated voters.
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