Rep. Mariannette Miller-Meeks, R-Iowa, a member of the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic as well as a member of the GOP Doctors Caucus, told Newsmax on Thursday that one way to hold the Chinese Communist Party accountable for its role in the origination of the COVID-19 virus is to demote the country's standing within the World Health Organization.
While appearing on "The Record With Greta Van Susteren," Miller-Meeks said the WHO should be penalized because "they carried the Chinese Communist Party message." Taiwan, South Korea, other countries in Asia were saying that the virus was transmitted human to human, and that this was a very serious virus that could lead to a worldwide pandemic.
"So how do you penalize? What you do is you have them demote China and the authority of China within the World Health Organization," she continued. "Then you promote within the World Health Organization Western entities, U.S. entities that we know are looking out not only for the United States and its citizens, but globally are looking towards what should be done and what the international community should do."
Miller-Meeks said when the Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic started researching possible origins of COVID-19, "at that time I said the reason why we need to know the origins of COVID-19 is the international community has a vested interest on what kind of research happens in what kind of lab. So laboratory safety and only [biosafety level 4 labs] should be used for the kind of research."
BSL-4 laboratories offer the highest level of containment in the study of infectious agents that pose a severe risk of aerosol-transmitted laboratory infections and life-threatening disease for which no vaccine or therapy is available. According to the Iowa representative, BSL-4 labs should have been used for any studies related to COVID-19.
Earlier this week, U.S. government officials revealed evidence that indicated the virus had first infected three Chinese research scientists and had escaped from the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China. Additionally, the Government Accountability Office on Wednesday disclosed that $2 million in U.S. taxpayer funds went to Chinese entities that conducted coronavirus research in Wuhan prior to global pandemic.
Miller-Meeks addressed the GAO's findings and echoed the sentiments of host Greta Van Susteren's previous guest, Adm. Brett Giroir, who said the U.S. needs "a strong military deterrence capacity" to respond to other nations or radical groups who could potentially employ the use of biological weapons.
"We all have an interest in the ethics of what kind of research is done, specifically gain of function research," Miller-Meeks said. "We went into a pause under the [Barack] Obama administration. The pause was just for a finite period of time. And then Dr. [Anthony] Fauci and other researchers actually pushed to reinstate gain of function research, which they did.
"There needs to be deterrence, as Adm. Giroir said, on if these things happen. There's supposed to be a 24-hour notice if there's a virus or bacteria that is released in a country — whether it's man-made or whether it's through nature — that can cause a pandemic.
"Adm. Giroir in our hearing in 2021 said that in 2011, the Chinese Communist Party was looking at viruses as bioweapons, as bioterrorism. So this is extraordinarily important.
"Everyone is concerned about nuclear weapons," Miller-Meeks said, "but biological threats are as, if not more important, because ... they know no boundaries."
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