Tough new U.S. sanctions will be imposed on China under a bill introduced Jan. 11 by Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.) and 15 co-sponsors if Beijing continues to refuse to “allow for a credible and comprehensive international investigation into the origins of COVID-19 at laboratories in Wuhan.”
The sanctions would become effective within 90 days after passage of the ‘‘Coronavirus Origin Validation, Investigation, and Determination Act of 2022’’ (COVID) if Beijing refuses to allow such a probe into the virus that has killed more than 800,000 Americans since March 2020.
