Foreign Ministry Spokesperson Geng Shuang (Photo from Foreign Ministry website)

US officials like Peter Navarro should stop confusing right and wrong while Washington should realize that the novel coronavirus is the enemy, not China, Chinese foreign ministry said in response to the US considering sending investigators to China to look into the outbreaks and some even insisted on making China pay for the losses caused by the pandemic. 

Given US President Donald Trump and Secretary State Mike Pompeo have been claiming that the coronavirus escaped from a Wuhan virology lab, China has mentioned many times that the origin of the virus is a scientific question, which should be evaluated by scientists and medical experts, and should not to be politicized, Geng Shuang, spokesperson of the Chinese Foreign Ministry, said at a routine press briefing on Monday. 

Yuan Zhiming, vice director of the Wuhan Institute of Virology, told Chinese state broadcaster CGTN that claiming the virus coming out of the lab was a "conspiracy theory" designed to "confuse" people and he also denied the virus was man-made, according to a video uploaded on Friday. 

However, Trump warned China on Saturday that Beijing should face consequences if it was "knowingly responsible" for the coronavirus pandemic, which is considered as an apparent signal of accelerating the war of words between the two nations.

Geng emphasized that currently, the World Health Organization and public health scientists and professionals in most countries, including the US, agree that there is no evidence that the new coronavirus originated in a laboratory.

The irresponsible spreading of conspiracy theories by the US alone will only cause interference in scientific research and cause damage to the cooperation between Chinese and American scientists. We demand that some Americans respect the facts, Geng noted. 

The spokesperson noted that the US should respect science and international opinion, and some people should realize that their enemy is the virus, not China, so their priority should focus on fighting the epidemic in their countries and enhancing the international cooperation instead of attacking China and shifting the blame to China. 

Concerning White House trade advisor Peter Navarro claimed that China 'cornered' the personal protective equipment market and 'is profiteering' during the novel coronavirus pneumonia (COVID-19) outbreak, Geng said such claim is confusing the right and wrong. 

From March 1 to April 17, China has provided in total 1.86 billion masks, 258 million pairs of medical and other gloves, 29.19 million sets of medical protective cloth, 3.13 million pairs goggles, 156 invasive ventilators, 4,254 non-invasive ventilators, facilitating the US purchase, which has been highly praised by the US society, Geng said. 

"We hope politicians like Navarro to stop spreading rumors and shifting blame to others, and focus on fighting the pandemic in the US," he noted. 

Some US officials also came up with ideas of making China pay for the losses caused by the pandemic, Geng said. China, like other countries in the world that are attacked by the virus, is a victim itself, not inflictor nor accomplice. Faced with a major public health crisis, the global community should become united and work with each other. "I don't even remember when there was such thing of holding accountable or asking to pay," Geng said. 

In 2009, when H1N1 started from the US and has spread to 214 countries and regions, causing nearly 200,000 deaths, who asked the US for paying their losses? He further questions. In the 1980s, AIDS was first discovered in the US and spread to the world, causing many people in the world suffering, who held the US accountable? And did anyone ask the US to bear the consequences of the financial turmoil in the US in 2008 and the collapse of Lehman Brothers, which eventually turned into a global financial crisis?