USA: The Deadly Game with Viruses Is Over

They were dismissed as dangerous conspiracy theorists. Now, Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and Jay Bhattacharya are putting an end to the very research many believe sparked the pandemic: gain-of-function.

USA Bans Experiments That Make Viruses More Deadly

On May 5, 2025, President Donald J. Trump signed an executive order banning gain-of-function research in the United States, experiments that make viruses more transmissible or lethal. The order also marks a reckoning with previous loopholes and circumventions. In 2014, under President Obama, a temporary pause was introduced, but Anthony Fauci and NIAID found a way around it by channeling funding to foreign labs, including the one in Wuhan. The new ban puts a firm end to such backdoor routes.

It prohibits all current and future federal funding of this research, not just within the U.S., but abroad as well. The order is a direct response to growing fears that such research may not only have contributed to the COVID-19 pandemic, but also represents an ongoing global threat.

Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. points out that this research has its roots in military experiments dating back to the 1940s, and that by 1969, the CIA claimed it had achieved the capability to wipe out the entire U.S. population for just 29 cents per person. According to him, the bioweapons race was reignited after 2001, hidden behind patriotism, pandemic fear, and private interests. Today, there is no doubt about the risk:

“There are, I think, three leaks from BSL-3 and BSL-4 labs, our highest-rated laboratories, almost every week. There’s no laboratory that does this right. There’s no laboratory that’s immune from leaks,” said Kennedy at the press conference. “The COVID outbreak cost 20 million lives and at least $25 trillion. This executive order is a precaution against being involved in that kind of research in the future.”

NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya called it “a historic day”: “This research does not protect us. It puts both our own population and the entire world at risk. Now the public has a voice. We can say no.”

Trump was direct: “I said it from day one, it leaked out of Wuhan. Maybe by accident. But it destroyed the world.”

Russia has long claimed that the U.S. is conducting bioweapons development in Ukraine and has filed formal allegations at the UN. These claims have been dismissed in the West, but with the pandemic as context, can we still reject it all as conspiracy?

FDA Commissioner Marty Makary concluded: “It’s crazy to think that the entire nightmare of COVID may have just been caused by some scientists messing with nature, using technology exported from the United States.”

Link to the Executive Order.

Excerpt from the press conference:

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Health Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr.:

“Mr. President, this is a historic day. It is the end of gain-of-function research funding by the federal government, and also of private corporations’ control over such studies. This was the kind of research engaged in by the U.S. military and intelligence agencies beginning in 1947. By 1969, the CIA said they had reached what they called ‘nuclear equivalency’—that they could kill the entire U.S. population for 29 cents per person.

That year, President Nixon went to Fort Detrick and announced a unilateral end to this kind of research—what they called dual-use research, meaning research for both vaccination and military purposes.

Nixon then persuaded over 180 countries to sign the Bioweapons Charter in 1973. That essentially ended gain-of-function research around the globe until about 2001 or 2002, after the anthrax attacks. We passed the Patriot Act, and it had a little-known provision in it that said, although the Bioweapons Charter and the Geneva Convention are still in effect, U.S. federal officials who violate them cannot be prosecuted. That relaunched the bioweapons arms race—and it was driven by gain-of-function research.

In 2014, three of those bugs escaped from U.S. labs. President Obama declared a moratorium on future use, but a lot of that research was moved offshore—to the Wuhan lab. That launched a bioweapons arms race all over the world. China is developing all kinds of weapons using AI and CRISPR technologies that are really devastating. Russia is deeply engaged in it, Iran and many other countries too. This is a kind of weapon that always has blowback. There is always bad news.

The justification has always been that we need to develop vaccines to counter future pandemics. But in the entire history of gain-of-function research, we can’t point to a single good thing that has come from it.

Today, I commend President Trump for his courage and vision in ending U.S. bioweapons research. Jay, maybe you can say something?”

NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya:

“This is a historic day. This kind of research—where pathogens are made more transmissible and dangerous to humans—is believed by many scientists to be responsible for the COVID pandemic. This research doesn’t protect us from pandemics or from other nations. What it does is pose a constant danger—that it may leak, even by accident, and cause a pandemic.

Any nation engaged in this research endangers both its own population and the world, as we saw during COVID. This executive order ensures that most science—science that poses no threat to humanity—can continue as normal. But the small fraction that carries the risk of harming every human being on earth? This order creates a framework so that the public has a say. Scientists alone won’t be allowed to make that decision anymore. The people can say: no, don’t take that risk.

I’m very proud to be here with President Trump, who has signed this order and, for the first time, put in place a real regulatory framework to end this research permanently.”

President Donald J. Trump:

“It can leak out—from Wuhan, for example. A lot of people think that. I said it from day one: it leaked. Maybe it was to a girlfriend or someone else. A scientist walked outside to have lunch with his girlfriend or was with a bunch of people. That’s how it leaked, in my opinion. I’ve never changed that opinion. It can leak out innocently, stupidly, incompetently—but innocently—and half destroy the world.”

Jay Bhattacharya:

“That’s right. That’s right, Mr. President.”

Robert F. Kennedy Jr.:

“There are, I think, three leaks from BSL-3 and BSL-4 labs—our highest-rated laboratories—almost every week. There’s no lab that does this right. No lab is immune to leaks.

This measure will prevent such accidental leaks in the future and protect humanity. The COVID outbreak cost 20 million lives and at least 25 trillion dollars globally. This executive order is a precaution against the U.S. being involved in that kind of research ever again.”

FDA Commissioner Marty Makary:

“It’s unbelievable to think that the entire nightmare of COVID may have been preventable. You had good instincts early on, Mr. President, in suggesting it came from the Wuhan lab. That’s now the leading theory among scientists. The lab was five miles from the hospital where the outbreak began.

It’s crazy to think this whole nightmare was likely caused by scientists messing with nature in a lab—using technology exported from the United States, like inserting a furin cleavage site. I hope this executive action does some good in the world. Thank you for doing it, Mr. President.”

About Susanne Heart: www.SusanneHeart.com