The release of Dr. Anthony Fauci's pandemic diaries has rekindled the debate over the origins of SARS-CoV-2. Here's how scientists have weighed in.

A SARS-CoV-2 infection could rouse from their sleep viruses that have long been established in the human body, including in people who were healthy until then. This is what research conducted by the University of Texas at Austin and published in the journal Nature reports.

"Although the pandemic is over, SARS-CoV-2 continues to cause infections with both acute and long-term ("long COVID") consequences," Levy wrote. "It is estimated that up to 50,000 Americans died of COVID in 2025 [to] 2026 and up to 10 million Americans may have suffered long COVID during the prior year."

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It wouldn't be surprising for a summer increase in COVID to begin now. Large numbers of people haven't fallen ill with COVID for quite a while.

Seventy-two severe cases of COVID-19 and 14 deaths related to the disease were confirmed last week, the highest weekly numbers this year, as hospital visits for COVID-19 also increased by 27.6 percent from the previous week,

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The number of new positive tests for the COVID-19 virus continued to soar in Door and Kewaunee counties over the past two weeks, but a slowdown over the past week in the number of cases apparently mirrors what's happening nationally and across the state.

The claim stemmed from two recent cohort studies, one from South Korea and one from Italy.