The lab-leak theory, that COVID-19 was leaked from a laboratory, has once again caused a clamor since the beginning of this year, months after the argument was thrown into the trash can of conspiracy theories by an overwhelming number of scientists.<p>Observers found that things only get more complicated when the origins of the coronavirus - an already difficult scientific issue - is entangled in political manipulation tricks. Combing through more than 8,000 pieces of news reports related to the lab-leak theory, the Global Times found that as many as 60 percent of the coverage was from the US alone.<p>It is worth noting that many media outlets in the US-led Western world, which hyped the lab-leak theory, are only willing to focus on the Chinese labs though they have been thoroughly investigated by the World Health Organization (WHO), while turning a blind eye to the more suspicious American biological research institutions, such as the infamous US Army Medical Research Institute of Infectious Diseases (USAMRIID) at Fort Detrick, Maryland.<p>The USAMRIID was temporarily shut down in 2019 after a Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) inspection. Although this mysterious lab reported the reason for the closure as "ongoing infrastructure issues with wastewater decontamination," the explanation was not persuasive enough. The Global Times found that the lab's failure to control toxins seemed to have alarmed the Countering Weapons of Mass Destruction related institutions in the US.