Per the Wall Street Journal -- which says it's reviewed an internal report by the U.S. Energy Dept. that was apparently shared with the White House and Congress recently -- the lab leak theory seems to hold true, at least based on their own investigation and findings.

The DoE's classified intelligence report concludes COVID likely slipped out into the public via a "mishap" at a lab in China -- unclear which one though, or under which exact circumstances -- and that they've reached this new determination with fresh intel. However, the report also notes their confidence is "low" in terms of being absolutely sure here.

Here's the thing ... the FBI arrived at a similar assessment in '21 on the origin of the virus -- through their own investigation -- but not every government agency agrees. In fact, there are 4 other (unidentified) agencies, as well as a national intelligence panel, that still feel it may have emerged through natural transmission ... but their confidence in that is also "low," according to WSJ. In other words, no one really knows -- but everyone has a good guess.

So, while this Energy report is far from a definitive say on how COVID came about -- it does open the door for debate ... which was widely shut down as conspiratorial 2-3 years ago, when regular folks were suggesting it might have been something man-made/man-spread.

In fact, some claimed they were being outright censored on social media for spreading this type of theory ... which was being written off at the time as misinformation, and some even went so far as to say it was racist and xenophobic in nature to even suggest the lab leak.