Coronavirus

The widow of a Missouri musician who died from COVID-19 in 2020 says that Dr. Anthony Fauci and the National Institutes of Health (NIH) are responsible for her husband’s death, and she is taking them to court.

Jimmy Dykes, a popular Kansas City musician and music teacher, died in November 2020 from COVID-19 after spending weeks on a ventilator. Now, his wife Leann Dykes is suing the National Institutes of Health (NIH), the National Institute of Allergy and Infections Diseases (NIAID), and the nonprofit EcoHealth Alliance (EHA), accusing them of indirectly causing her husband’s death. The suit alleges negligence, wrongful death, and strict liability, and singles out both Fauci, as the head of NIAID and Francis Collins, as the head of the NIH, for responsibility as well.

The complaint starts with the allegation that ahead of the worldwide coronavirus pandemic a lab in Wuhan, China, was conducting “gain-of-function” (GOF) research.

The lawsuit describes GOF research as follows:

Gain of function research is research that involves experimentation and is expected to increase the transmissibility and/or virulence of pathogens. Gain of function research aims to make viruses more infectious and deadlier or more virulent, often to humans. Gain of function experiments are conducted to make viruses more contagious or deadly.

This description doesn’t paint the whole picture. According to 2014 NIH-commissioned white paper, the “ultimate objective of such research is to better inform public health and preparedness efforts and/or development of medical countermeasures.”

The complaint contains other allegations that lack context.

“On or about September of 2019, the COVID-19 virus leaked from the Wuhan Institute of Virology Laboratory in Wuhan, China, which was actively performing research into coronaviruses, including gain of function research,” the complaint says.

The origin of the coronavirus has not been definitively determined. A Republican-issued Senate report concluded that the pandemic was most likely caused by a lab leak, but scientists dispute that conclusion.

The lawsuit says that the NIH and NIAID, through a grant to EHA from 2014 to 2019, was at least partially funding that research, but that is not at all clear. The NIH, for its part, denies that any U.S. funding went to gain-of-function research in Wuhan.

“[N]either NIH nor NIAID have ever approved any grant that would have supported ‘gain-of-function’ research on coronaviruses that would have increased their transmissibility or lethality for humans,” the NIH said in a statement in May 2021.

Multiple fact checks have also shown that claims from Republican lawmakers of U.S. funding of GOF research in Wuhan do not always bear out.

But according to Leann Dykes’ lawsuit, that’s exactly what happened.

Per the complaint:

The United States, acting by and through Mr. Collins and Mr. Fauci, was negligent and careless in one or more of the following respects:

(a) At the time NIH and NIAID funded monies to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, Mr. Collins and Mr. Fauci, knew or should have known that the Wuhan Institute was conducting research into coronaviruses, including gain of function research.

(b) At the time NIH and NIAID funded monies to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, Mr. Collins and Mr. Fauci knew or should have known that there existed serious biosafety problems at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.

(c) At the time NIH and NIAID funded monies to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, Mr. Collins and Mr. Fauci knew or should have known that they had no oversight and no way of knowing how safe the laboratories were where these risky experiments were taking place.

Notwithstanding these facts, Mr. Collins and Mr. Fauci negligently and carelessly funded monies to the Wuhan Institute of Virology which they had no supervision nor control over.

Leann Dykes says that the defendants’ negligence “directly and proximately caused or contributed to cause the deceased to die and also to endure pain and suffering between the time he contracted COVID-19 and the time of his death.” She is claiming damages based on “pain and suffering” under Missouri’s wrongful death statute, and is seeking compensation for “the loss of services, consortium, companionship, comfort, instruction, guidance, counsel, training, and support by reason of death.”

“As a direct and proximate result of the negligent actions and omissions of Defendants NIH, NIAID, United States and the EHA in funding monies to the Wuhan Institute Of Virology, the Wuhan Institute created a deadly coronavirus that leaked from its laboratory and spread worldwide, causing the death of Jimmy C. Dykes, Plaintiff’s husband,” the complaint says.

In addition to negligence and wrongful death, Leann Dykes is also suing under a theory of strict liability, arguing that EHA, in funding the Wuhan lab, “engaged in an abnormally dangerous activity, and is liable” for Jimmy Dykes’ death and Leann Dykes’ subsequent damages.

Leann Dykes did not name a specific amount in damages.

Representatives for Leann Dykes and the defendants did not immediately respond to Law&Crime’s emailed requests for comment.

America's top infectious disease expert, who became the face of the pandemic with his daily television updates, has spoken out against "low-life" trolls harassing his wife and children, figuring out where they live and their phone numbers.

"I have good security protection, but I really think it's so cowardly to harass people who are completely uninvolved, including my children," Dr Anthony Fauci told the BBC's Americast podcast.

Dr Fauci, who became a target for online conspiracy movements after advising on the Covid-19 pandemic, said he tries his best not to be distracted by online hate that "takes away from your ability to do your job".

As chief medical adviser to the US President he was the country's top medical expert and the voice of the government's pandemic response, during both the Trump and Biden administration, providing daily updates to the American public, encouraging mask use and vaccination.

He frequently clashed with former President Donald Trump, who once threatened to fire him.

Conspiracy theorists accused Dr Fauci of playing a key role in a sinister plot to control and harm people with Covid-19 and vaccines, contrary to the evidence.

Two people have previously been arrested and imprisoned in the US for what Dr Fauci described as "credible attempts on [his] life."

He warned about a "tsunami of misinformation and disinformation" in his country, including on social media. But he refused to comment on Twitter's recent decision to stop labelling and removing Covid-19 misinformation, because he feared being accused of "trying to suppress people's freedom of speech".

The 81-year-old is stepping down as chief medical adviser to President Joe Biden this month and head of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID).

Dr Fauci has served under seven presidents, including Joe Biden, Donald Trump and Barack Obama, starting with Republican Ronald Reagan during the HIV AIDS epidemic.

But he was thrust further into the public eye during the Covid-19 pandemic, where decisions he and other scientific advisers made about restrictions and medical advice were under scrutiny.

At times, he clashed with Donald Trump's approach to managing the pandemic.

He said it was not easy to publicly disagree with a sitting president and that it "generated an extraordinary amount of hostility" from "far-right" activists in the US.

When asked whether the severity of lockdowns in some American states was misjudged, Dr Fauci disagreed.

He dismissed the approach taken by Sweden, which did not immediately go into lockdown, but advocated voluntary social distancing.

"I would not under any circumstances adopt the Swedish model because if you look at the deaths and hospitalisations in Sweden compared to other Scandinavian countries, it's much, much worse," Dr Fauci told Americast.

Dr Fauci, who will turn 82 on 24 December, said he will continue to work in healthcare.

Coronavirus may spread from corpses

Like a zombie in a horror film, the coronavirus can persist in the bodies of infected patients well after death, even spreading to others, according to two startling studies.

The risk of contagion is mainly to those who handle cadavers, like pathologists, medical examiners and health care workers, and in settings like hospitals and nursing homes, where many deaths may occur.

While transmission from corpses is not likely to be a major factor in the pandemic, bereaved family members should exercise caution, experts said.

“In some countries, people who have died of Covid-19 are being left unattended or taken back to their homes,” said Hisako Saitoh, a researcher at Chiba University in Japan who published two recent studies on the phenomenon.

“Therefore, I think that it is a knowledge that the general public should be aware of,” he wrote in an email.

Several studies have found traces of infectious virus in corpses for as long as 17 days after death. Dr. Saitoh and his colleagues went further, showing that dead bodies may carry significant amounts of infectious virus, and that dead hamsters can transmit it to live cage mates.

The research has not yet been vetted for publication in a scientific journal, but outside experts said that the studies were well-done and the results compelling.

The risk of a live patient spreading the coronavirus is far greater than the potential transmission from corpses, Dr. Saitoh and other scientists emphasized.

If infection from corpses accounted for a large number of cases, “we would have noticed, right?” said Vincent Munster, a virologist at the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Still, “If there is an infectious virus, there is always a risk for transmission,” he continued. “I don’t think it’s something which is often addressed.”

In the United States, bodies usually are embalmed soon after death or cremated. But in the Netherlands, where Dr. Munster grew up, as in many parts of the world, family members may wash and dress the bodies.

In July 2020, the Japanese government urged bereaved family members to keep their distance from dead bodies and refrain from touching them — or even viewing them. Officials also recommended sealing corpses in impermeable bags and cremating them within 24 hours.

The guidelines were revised in May 2022 to allow family members to see loved ones who died of Covid, but “in an appropriately infection-controlled hospital room.”

Those guidelines in part prompted Dr. Saitoh to explore what happens to the virus in the body after death.

He and his colleagues looked at samples from the noses and the lungs of 11 people who had died of Covid. The researchers found that high amounts of virus persisted in six of the 11 corpses, even 13 days after death.

“It was surprising that infectious titers were preserved at the same high levels as in the clinical patients,” Dr. Saitoh wrote. “What was most surprising, however, were the results of the animal experiments.”

In those experiments, he and his colleagues found that hamsters that died within a few days of becoming infected with the coronavirus could transmit it to other animals. In people, too, contagion is most likely when a patient dies soon after infection, when the levels of virus in the body are very high, the researchers said.

The team found more virus in the lungs of human corpses than in the upper respiratory tract. That suggests that those who perform autopsies should be particularly careful when handling the lungs, experts said. Dr. Saitoh pointed to a study from Thailand describing a forensic practitioner who appeared to have been infected during work.

Gases that build up after death can be expelled through any orifice in the body, including the mouth, and may carry infectious virus, the researchers said. Embalming or practicing so-called “angel care” — a Japanese ritual in which the mouth, nose, ears and anus are plugged with cotton pads — prevented transmission, they found.

Contagious corpses are not without precedent. Most famously, funeral and burial practices have triggered large outbreaks of Ebola virus in Africa.

But the coronavirus is very different, noted Angela Rasmussen, a research scientist at the Vaccine and Infectious Disease Organization at the University of Saskatchewan in Canada.

Up to 70 percent of those infected with Ebola die. The figure for Covid is nowhere near as high — greater than 3 percent in the early days of the pandemic, and something closer to 1 percent or even less now. And the Ebola virus floods every part of the body, so the risk of transmission, even after death, is far greater than might be seen with the coronavirus.

“With Ebola, it’s clearly direct contact with bodily fluids, because there’s high titers of Ebola pretty much everywhere in somebody who’s died from Ebola,” Dr. Rasmussen said.

She was initially skeptical that the coronavirus could spread from dead bodies but found the new studies convincing.

“Most people probably still need to worry a lot more about getting Covid from their living neighbors than their recently deceased ones,” she said.

But they “should be very cautious about physical contact with their loved ones’ remains,” she added.

I also had two shots and two boosters...

The Covid deaths had these huge blood clots that would clog their drains.