Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed • Hacker News Board

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#261

Post by inglor_cz » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:13 PM UTC

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #205

cowmoo728 wrote: post #184

Earlier quoted context omitted.

COVID-19 is one of the few serious diseases that can transmit when the carrier is asymptomatic. That could be a credible reason why a potential lab leak went unnoticed for long enough to begin uncontrolled community spread.

> COVID-19 is one of the few serious diseases that can transmit when the carrier is asymptomatic. Is this actually true? It is certainly not true for HIV, and of course is not relevant to diseases like Zika that are transmitted by mosquitos. Edit: I found the answer to my own question: https://www.kff.org/infographic/ebola-characteristics-and-co... (see second bullet point). Given that this lists Hep C, HIV, Influenz…

As always, it is not a 1-0 situation, but a question of degree.

You can catch flu from an asymptomatic person, but Covid has a much higher reproduction factor. During the winter lockdown in England, regular flu was completely eradicated - literally not a single case was detected in entire England [0]. At the same time, Covid was still spreading happily. The measures that stopped flu in its tracks only slightly inconvenienced SARS-Cov-2.

Covid is simply too good at spreading, compared to other similar diseases.

(As an analogy: I can swim, Michael Phelps can swim, we can both call ourselves swimmers, but we are not really comparable.)

[0]https://www.independent.co.uk/news/health/flu-cases-covid-en...

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#262

Post by ninkendo » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:13 PM UTC

varjag wrote: post #192

tehjoker wrote: post #161

Pretty incredible how far the US media will go to deflect attention from how bad the US response to the pandemic was to China. "Let me be clear: Labs in Wuhan might not have played any role in the origin of the pandemic. But a year later, no source has been found, and the world deserves a thorough, unbiased investigation of all plausible theories that is conducted without fear or favor." Okay. So basically this autho…

No, the evidence is there's a relevant viral research lab in the epicentre with known history of safety issues and no animal transmission link have been confirmed.

Epicenters of a disease like this (respiratory disease with asymptomatic transmission) are likely to be in an urban area, so it's not surprising it's in a large city.

In a typical city the size of Wuhan, what are the odds it has some sort of viral research lab? If this happened in (picking a city at random...) Chicago, you could work backwards, find a viral research lab in say, University of Illinois, and make the same claim. "No link to animal transmission has been found, and the original epicenter was known to have a viral research lab. QED."

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#263

Post by drran » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:13 PM UTC

crx07 wrote: post #21

This has honestly been my unbiased opinion since essentially day 1. I believe that the release was almost certainly a complete accident, but there's just no realistic chance a novel virus coincidentally originates in the same isolated place as a lab that specializes in that exact same type of virus. The denialists, including the WHO and CDC and everyone else, need to get real and own up to what happened and figure ou…

You may want to read this article:

https://jglobalbiosecurity.com/articles/10.31646/gbio.41/

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#264

Post by whiddershins » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:13 PM UTC

Huffers2 wrote: post #157

If true, I think this would be the first ever case of a novel virus ever being developed in a lab and then accidentally released. If false, then it's yet another viral mutation / species cross over which have happened all the time throughout history. When I hear hoofbeats I think "horses" not "zebras"...

If I’m walking down the street and get surprised with a punch in the face I assume it was intentional, even if there are many scenarios in which it could be accidental.

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#265

Post by rcpt » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:13 PM UTC

koheripbal wrote: post #200

woodruffw wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm not claiming that they don't! The article has multiple examples of viruses escaping either individual containment or the lab outright. What I'm claiming is that the volume of attributed escapes indicates that the average escape has relatively local consequences. In other words: historically, when everything goes wrong, it hasn't resulted in a global pandemic. What, then, made or makes COVID special? Maybe the ans…

COVID-19 is special because it doesn't cause severe illness in most people. SARS killed a far far higher percentage of people it came in contact with, and made 100% of them sick, so it was much more easily detected, and therefore contained.

Right. The last case of smallpox was from a lab leak but people knew better than to fuck around with that.

Covid is asymptomatic and mild enough in enough people that masks get political

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#266

Post by SpaceRaccoon » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:14 PM UTC

tbenst wrote: post #239

SpaceRaccoon wrote: post #207

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Could you explain why evidence that the virus evolved naturally contradicts the lab-leak theory? I'm all ears and waiting to hear the reasoning. As others have pointed out, lab-leak does not imply artificially developed. > I’m a bioscientist. And I'm a Bayesian analyst. Surely your position is that it is a coincidence that: - the virus appeared to originate in Wuhan - genome sequences from patients were 96% or 89% id…

No, it is not a coincidence. There are a lot of bats in Wuhan. There are a lot of bats carrying coronaviruses. Coronaviruses have triggered past epidemics. Ergo, there’s an institute for virology in Wuhan. Listen starting at 6:30 in the podcast I posted from Nature. There is indeed strong correlation but no causal relationship established.

> There are a lot of bats in Wuhan.

Except everything I've read indicates the bats carrying the most closely related virus are not in Wuhan, not even close:

> The SARS-CoV-2 virus is most closely related to coronaviruses found in certain populations of horseshoe bats that live about 1,000 miles (1,600 kilometers) away in Yunnan province, China. [0]

[0] https://www.livescience.com/coronavirus-wuhan-lab-complicate...

So why would the virus so strongly appear to originate in Wuhan, and not in another city, closer to the bats' native regions? Appears quite statistically unlikely.

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#267

Post by varjag » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:14 PM UTC

tehjoker wrote: post #214

varjag wrote: post #192

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No, the evidence is there's a relevant viral research lab in the epicentre with known history of safety issues and no animal transmission link have been confirmed.

There's evidence that many things are possible. Conspiracies are possible, but they are primarily a diagnosis of exclusion OR if there is specific evidence pointing in that direction. The US media has made an art out of turning speculation into exciting narratives that large fractions of the population believe that turned out to be completely fabricated but retain adherents for years or generations after.

It's not a conspiracy, but a not improbable covered up accident. I.e. something pretty normal in any authoritarian state.

I don't think anyone suggests the CCP unleashed the virus onto its own city on purpose.

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#268

Post by 8note » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:15 PM UTC

echelon wrote: post #116

tossaway12321 wrote: post #93

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is as well my strongly held belief, and the most likely cause. And people making the really odd responses below. They're, not saying it, but insinuating that the lab would be where there is lots of bat coronavirus? The lab is in the city of Wuhan. A city with a population of 11 million people. This isn't some rural town. There was a lab that studied this type of coronavirus, had published papers on it. And in a…

> My hopeful opinion is that this leads to more stringent worldwide rules for reporting leaks, and checking of safety practices to avoid this happening again A leak that results in 2.7 million worldwide deaths will not result in "more stringent worldwide rules for reporting leaks". It would result in economic reparations and possibly war. Leak or not, it's in China's interest to prevent the blame from falling on them…

It's even more in China's interest to not have more such leaks, or to have other countries have similar leaks.

Their manufacturing economy does not benefit from being locked down on a regular basis

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#269

Post by esja » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:15 PM UTC

colllectorof wrote: post #195

crx07 wrote: post #21

This has honestly been my unbiased opinion since essentially day 1. I believe that the release was almost certainly a complete accident, but there's just no realistic chance a novel virus coincidentally originates in the same isolated place as a lab that specializes in that exact same type of virus. The denialists, including the WHO and CDC and everyone else, need to get real and own up to what happened and figure ou…

Look, dude, leading experts have looked at this claim and said there is nearly zero chance this has was a lab leak: https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/04/23/8417296... I mean, yeah, five out of 6 cited experts have ties to EcoHealth Alliance, which in turn has funding ties to one of the two virology labs in Wuhan, but that's, like, just a coincidence. If it wasn't, I'm sure NPR would mention it. And then…

You're also forgetting that these people are scientists. Scientists only look at the facts and are completely unbiased - they aren't like normal humans, who might be worried about their entire livelihoods being cancelled (or worse) if the world realises their research is too dangerous to exist. And scientists who work for political organisations are the most unbiased of all. /s

Re: Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

#270

Post by mancerayder » Mon, Mar 22, 2021, 9:15 PM UTC

bosswipe wrote: post #121

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not OP, but I'm assuming he was arguing that, given that the major social media platforms have said they will remove any Covid information that is misleading, would they even allow posts like this "suggesting the possibility of a Wuhan lab leak is plausible". Note Facebook has previously explicitly banned posts "falsely claiming the virus is man-made". Source: https://www.npr.org/2021/02/08/965390755/facebook-widens-…

From FB's policy https://www.facebook.com/help/230764881494641 " Claims that it was created by an individual, government, or country Excluding claims that it was studied in, came from, or leaked from a lab without specifically calling it man-made" So discussing possibility of a lab leak is not a problem, it's the deliberate bioweapon aspect that they're banning. "The goal of this policy is to remove common viral hoax…

How are these Fact Checkers to decide on a complicated and political question like a Wuhan lab leak hypothesis? They have a claim to truth, based on what credentials or mechanisms, that the rest of us don't have access to?