Whether or not SARS-COV2 leaked from the lab in Wuhan (I think the evidence is abundant now that it did) is the central point, and may have been the first lie, the lie that set off a whole cascade of lies.
I think Fauci and possibly Francis Collins believed that it did leak from the Wuhan lab, from research funded by NIAID, and that it was engineered to be more harmful than the average virus and once they lied to the public about this, they were caught in a no-win situation, for then the Pharma companies swooped in and offered salvation in the form of the new mRNA jabs.
This led to the panicked coercion of the populace - “Oh my God, we created this, and now it’s loose, we’ve got to make doubly certain that people take the vaccines.”
Just my opinion.
Of course until this is publicly acknowledged, there will still be a sour taste in the mouths many people.