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Dr. Anthony Fauci completed the second day of his closed-door grilling with members of the House Select Subcommittee on the Coronavirus Pandemic, in which he reportedly admitted that the six-foot social distancing rule that emerged at the start of the coronavirus pandemic was actually based on nothing. The committee, led by chairman Rep. Brad Wenstrup (R-OH), provided a brief recap of Tuesday’s session. Monday and Tuesday’s sessions totaled 14 hours, according to lawmakers. In Tuesday’s session, Fauci admitted that the six-foot social distancing recommendation “was likely not based on any data,” according to the committee.

Bill Gates has warned that governments must prepare for future pandemics and smallpox terror attacks by investing billions in research and development. Mr Gates made the warning during a Policy Exchange interview with the chair of the Health Select Committee Jeremy Hunt. The Microsoft founder also called for the formation of a new billion-dollar World Health Organisation Pandemic Task Force. While the research may be expensive, he said that it could also lead to other innovations, such as eradicating flu and the common cold. He said that countries like the US and the UK must spend “tens of billions” to...

AGHDAD, Iraq, April 26 — Nissar Hindawi, a leading figure in Iraq's biological warfare program in the 1980's, says the stories and explanations he and other scientists told the United Nations about the extent of Iraq's efforts to produce poisons and germ weapons "were all lies."Dr. Hindawi, imprisoned during the final weeks of Saddam Hussein's rule, is now free to talk about his experiences in the program, in which he says he was forced to work from 1986 to 1989 and again sporadically until the mid-1990's. Iraq, as it belatedly acknowledged, he says, "produced huge quantities" of liquid anthrax and...

SYRIA EXPELS LEADING IRAQI WMD SCIENTIST WASHINGTON [MENL] -- The United States has captured one of the directors of Iraq's weapons of mass destruction programs who had been expelled by Syria. U.S. officials said coalition forces arrested the head of Iraq's biological weapons program. They identified the scientist as Huda Salih Mahdi Ammash, known as Mrs. Anthrax, No. 53 on the U.S. list of 55 most wanted Iraqis. Ms. Ammash, whose husband, a senior aide to President Saddam Hussein, was captured last week, escaped to Syria in early April, officials said. They said her arrest came after strong U.S. pressure...

A new gene-based technology may soon allow exposure to mystery biological weapons to be identified in a few hours. Experts say that if this early detection means treatment is highly effective, then the harm that can be caused by biological weapons would be substantially lessened, reducing their attractiveness to attackers. A person's cells react almost immediately after exposure, according to US army scientists, and the combination of genes expressed is unique for each biological agent. So by examining gene expression, it is possible to rapidly identify the agent, as well as the level of exposure, and tailor treatment accordingly. Marti...