At a recent wedding, my dinner partner and I chuckled about week-after-weddings Covid outbreaks.

That led to discussing the known statements of a handful of People’s Liberation Army (PLA) colonels and general officers asserting that the PLA was working to produce pathogens for operations.

Our discussion extended to the “illegal laboratory filled with infectious agents, medical waste, and hundreds of mice” (Illegal lab in California carried bioengineered mice, infectious agents (usatoday.com)) discovered in Reedley, California in 2022. Local officials said the lab had ties to China.

Continuing, we recalled the FDA’s concern that the 2018 flu strains were stretching the US supply of intravenous saline bags. Just one pathogen introduced in just a few US municipal water supplies could reduce the United States saline bag supply to near nothing in a matter of days.

With China’s apparent capability and Americans’ clear exposure, my dinner partner asked, “Why aren’t our government officials telling us about this?”

Before I had time to write this, Covid struck me.