U.S. government agencies sent almost $29 million in taxpayer dollars “directly to Chinese entities” for joint research over a five-year period ending in 2021, recently released findings show.
From fiscal years 2015 through 2021, “the CDC [Centers for Disease Control and Prevention], NIH [National Institutes of Health], and DOD [Department of Defense] provided 22 awards totaling $28.9 million directly to Chinese entities, including universities and other research institutions,” the Government Accountability Office (GAO) said on Sept. 29 about a trove of analyses.
Researchers found the federal funding focused on “multiple scientific disciplines,” aiding Chinese entities in conducting research on “disease surveillance, vaccination studies, and the development of new drugs,” as well as “alternative technologies to propel vehicles such as drones.”
The release of the 38-page GAO report (pdf) follows a January request from House Republican Conference Chairwoman Elise Stefanik (R-N.Y.) and Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), the top Republican on the House Foreign Affairs Committee. They asked the GAO to review federal funds provided to China or to entities controlled by the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for collaborative research, and U.S. contributions to multilateral institutions.
Stefanik described such funding as “troubling.”
“China’s deception and stonewalling of the truth behind the origins of COVID-19 has led to millions of senseless deaths and trillions of dollars in economic destruction across the globe,” she said in a statement to The Epoch Times.
The three agencies provided funding for a total of 13 Chinese entities for joint publications, information sharing, and workshops, while 84 percent of the direct funding went to the University of Hong Kong, Peking University, and the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention, known as the Chinese CDC.
While receiving almost $5 million from the NIH and the CDC in recent years, the Chinese CDC had been suppressing information about the COVID-19 outbreak domestically and snubbed U.S. offers of assistance, although any health data would have been crucial to formulate a more effective pandemic containment strategy and minimize the disease’s global spread.
By Rita Li
