President Trump has insisted on calling the coronavirus the “Chinese virus” to stoke anger in the US

The Trump administration has ordered US intelligence agencies to investigate reports that the coronavirus may have escaped from a Chinese biological laboratory in Wuhan.

Questions over the origins of the pandemic are part of a larger diplomatic wrestling match between China and the United States in which Washington appears to be gaining ground.

Wuhan’s “wet market”, where live and dead wild and domestic animals are sold, is the most likely ground zero and an infected bat the most likely host, but no definitive evidence has been found.

General Mark Milley, chairman of the joint chiefs of staff, confirmed that intelligence agencies were looking at whether an accident at the laboratory could have been responsible. He said that natural causes still looked more likely, however.

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