Columbia professor who thanked Fauci for Wuhan lab messaging maintains close ties to China

Walter Ian Lipkin, a professor of epidemiology at Columbia University, thanked Dr. Anthony Fauci for publicly dismissing notions that the virus could have originated and leaked from the Wuhan lab.

G Fauci's coronavirus-related emails showed that he had worked behind the scenes to sow doubt about the virus leaking from the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the Washington Examiner noted in early June.  "We deeply appreciate your efforts in steering and messaging," Lipkin wrote to Fauci on May 5, 2020, a day after he cast doubt on the lab leak theory.