The Department of Defense (DOD) in December awarded a $3 million grant to EcoHealth Alliance Inc, the nonprofit organization that for years prior to the COVID-19 pandemic funneled money to the Wuhan Institute of Virology in China. The DOD awarded the approximately $2,987,827.07 grant to EcoHealth beginning Dec. 12 for the purpose of “reducing the threat of viral spillover from wildlife in the Philippines,” according to USASpending.gov, a database of spending by the federal government. The grant will expire in December 2025, the records show.
According to records, the grant was awarded as part of a Defense Threat Reduction Agency (DTRA) program that aims to “support and stimulate basic, applied and advanced research at educational or research institutions, non-profit organizations, and commercial firms, which support the advancement of fundamental knowledge and understanding of the sciences with an emphasis on exploring new and innovative research for combating or countering Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD).”
DTRA has spent from $100,000 per year to $1,000,000 per year over a 5-year period on such research, according to the System for Award Management (SAM). EcoHealth Alliance describes itself as a “global environmental health nonprofit organization dedicated to protecting wildlife and public health from the emergence of disease,” on its official website. However, the New York-based nonprofit has come under scrutiny from Republican lawmakers and experts after documents released in 2021 detailed its work using federal money to fund research into bat coronaviruses at the Chinese lab.