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US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

reuters.com

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Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#581

Post by tim333 »

amelius wrote: post #574
tim333 wrote: post #573

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's not that easy to do in many cases. The human manipulation is often infecting cells in a lab rather than entering a sequence in a computer and synthesising it. However making it a regulation to keep samples and publish sequences would probably make sense.

Ok. Perhaps we should stop making viruses until we are more technologically capable then.

Well, yeah. People have argued in favour including Fauci famously but I think the dangers likely outweigh the benefits.

Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#582

Post by tim333 »

ggm wrote: post #557

Plausible is not evidence. Gain of function as I understand it leaves signs. If scientists say they don't see the signs, that's absence of evidence. On the other hand zoonotic disease is known to exist. Please do not allow dislike of a state party system to pollute your thinking. Your views about China do not inform what happened and in the end, this becomes repetitive. I might add that I dislike many things about ot…

Serial passage doesn't leave much signs apart from maybe those observed.

Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#583

Post by fsflover »

buran77 wrote: post #232
fsflover wrote: post #206

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This principle applies to individuals, not to the governments. The latter are created by people to serve people and must be open and transparent. The alternative is being corrupt.

> must be open and transparent. The alternative is being corrupt. I think you oversimplified to get to this binary view. Where does "national security" fit in this "transparent or corrupt" philosophy? State secrets? Classified information and intelligence? Can the Chinese (or other) authorities simply raise deep concerns about whatever they want and expect US (or other) authorities to provide information as needed to…

I indeed intentionally oversimplified that, but consider how NSA is doing illegal things for the sake of "national security", because they are not tranparent or checked by anyone.

Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#584

Post by tim333 »

raverbashing wrote: post #554
tim333 wrote: post #532

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Sars-Cov-2 looks like pretty much what it is: a zoonotic virus that "doesn't know what's going on" It was actually remarkably stable in the early days suggesting it was used to reproducing in human cells. Or so Professor Petrovsky says https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8356751/How-COVID-1... As how that could have happened lab wise here's Daszak saying they routinely infect human cells with coronavirus in the…

"Human cells" are mammal cells. Macaques and Golden Hamsters can get sick with Covid-19 The common Flu can infect horses and even chickens. "stability in human cells" means pretty much nothing

I mean stability in that the sequence of the virus is much the same as it was a month before. That's not true when a virus jumps species - they evolve rapidly to the new species.

Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#585

Post by tremon »

berdario wrote: post #572
tremon wrote: post #562

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A discussion in good faith does not begin with "[TFA] is twisting the truth."

If the agency that published the article is twisting the truth, shouldn't that be called out?

It's your presumption to already know the "truth" that can never lead to a discussion in good faith, not your opinion on the article itself.

But as to your point, are you asserting that none of the team’s investigators ever said anything like "China refused to give raw data on early COVID-19 cases to the WHO-led team probing the origins of the pandemic"? Where is your proof that the statement you quoted is false?

Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#586

Post by pinipedman »

tim333 wrote: post #569
pinipedman wrote: post #565

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Criticizing such details are not the same as criticizing the system itself. Preferring one implementation of capitalism over another isn't a criticism of capitalism. Similarly, espousing one political party over another isn't criticism of democracy. If you suggest eliminating private property to mitigate certain ills engendered by capitalism, or express another view that is truly antithetical to capitalism then you w…

Well googling "capitalism broken" gives plenty of results. I admit eliminating private property doesn't get much respect but that's a different thing.

Are those articles suggesting how to fix capitalism or are they actually suggesting eliminating private ownership of the means of production? There are numerous example of the latter being crushed by, e.g. the CIA among others, for around a century. As for how they are marginalized, I'd challenge you to name a single instance of a capitalist state becoming anything else. There have been a few, e.g. China, USSR, PRK, Cuba, etc. which became state capitalism, but that's still a form of capitalism. The anarcho-syndaclists in Spain tried, but they were crushed by the state.

Private property is inextricably linked with capitalism. If there is no private property there can be no private ownership of the means of production, hence no capitalism. Conversely, within capitalism there is private ownership of the means of production hence there can be no private property, only personal property.

Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#587

Post by kergonath »

Terretta wrote: post #315
kergonath wrote: post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Studies have shown that it was circulating in France back in November 2019. Not saying it originated there, there’s no indication of that, but there is a possibility that it had already been spreading for some time before December 2019.

The “detected in Barcelona sewer water in March 2019” stories from June 2020 didn’t seem to go anywhere either. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-health-coronavirus-spain-... Kept searching for followups, didn’t see anything till this: https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S004896972... That’s from 21 January 2021 and says: “So far unpublished data, analysing retained wastewater samples from Barcelona, S…

Yeah what I have seen about the Barcelona samples was not very convincing at the time, but then I am not an epidemiologist and I’d be happy to read more.

The French study has just been published last week [0]. It is based on a vast cohort study in which serum samples were collected regularly. They tested older samples and found some anti-SARS-CoV-2 antibodies. The article also mentions an Italian study with similar results [1].

[0] https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10654-020-00716-2

[1] https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/0300891620974755

Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#588

Post by eloff »

whymauri wrote: post #444
eloff wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> in these disgusting third-world wet markets That's old information. The first cases of the virus had no connection with the wet market, and no connection could later be found other than it was the first major subsequent point of spreading for the virus. So it's much more likely that people spread it at the market, rather than that it came from there. However, they are indeed disgusting third-world wet markets and t…

Unless you're advocating pure vegetarianism, prolonged animal husbandry will inevitably lead to more diseases crossing to humans. The idea that this is only a problem in Africa and Asia is entirely nonsensical.

> Prolonged animal husbandry will inevitably lead to more diseases crossing to humans

Yes

> The idea that this is only a problem in Africa and Asia is entirely nonsensical.

No, this statement of yours is nonsensical. What I'm saying is the practice of eating bush meat, and these kinds of wet markets bring very little value by themselves. Compared to animal husbandry in general, not even 1% of the total value. However, they represent an outsized proportion of the risk. So it's a bad idea. One could improve the risk-reward ratio by eliminating them - entirely logical.

Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#589

Post by mgamache »

cameldrv wrote: post #462
mgamache wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Right, playing with fire, by creating an environment that would hyper-evolve virus better than random natural species interactions.

SARS-CoV-2 is a really contagious virus, but as long as the biosecurity is perfect, there is no risk.

As long as biosecurity evolves humans it will not be perfect.

Re: US raises ‘deep concerns’ over WHO report on Covid’s Wuhan origins

#590

Post by tim333 »

quandrum wrote: post #459
izzydata wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know why whenever people bring up that the virus might have come from a lab it always gets dismissed because the virus doesn't look artificial. Why is it never brought up that it could just be an accident? It doesn't need to be a weapon. Just poor safety during research.

Why did everyone brush over the Italians finding it in blood samples from September 19, 2 months before the outbreak in Wuhan? Certain actors have a narrative they would like to push.

11% having antibodies in September seems implausible. There would have been a major outbreak to get those numbers. It's more likely false positives on the test.
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