Slack messages released by Rand Paul appear to show authors of key COVID-19 origin paper held private doubts

Slack messages released by Rand Paul reveal private doubts among authors of a key 2020 paper on the origins of SARS-CoV-2, suggesting they were uncertain about the virus's bat origin and considered a lab-leak possibility, despite their public conclusion ruling out a laboratory origin. The authors, including Kristian Andersen and Eddie Holmes, acknowledged limited evidence and internal debates over the furin cleavage site, while coordinating with U.S. intelligence and NIH.