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More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

nytimes.com

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Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#91

Post by Dah00n »

ping_pong wrote: post #29

What's the point? After reading all the evidence, people such as myself firmly believe that it came from the Wuhan lab. Nothing the inquiry will come up with convince me otherwise. It's pretty obvious once you read all of the unbiased articles that show that months earlier, the same research facilities and scientists were touting their research in gain-of-function in bat coronaviruses. I mean come on! Bureacracies li…

You haven't read enough evidence to know the cause no matter how much you follow the case as we have hardly started collecting evidence. It's still in early preliminary stages.

To find a source we need a host. We haven't even found a host from SARS yet even though that happened back in 2002. All we have is a very closely related one (96% match?) and that was found in 2020. It takes a lot of work by scientists living among wild animals for years in often very remote locations. Stating it was from a lab after so little time has past and so little work has been done is at a minimum jumping to conclusions.

Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#92

Post by JohnWhigham »

bko wrote: post #36
btilly wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The question is whether the type of research that might have lead to this result should be shut down to prevent similar accidents in the future. If COVID-19 was, in fact, a lab release then that's a strong argument for shutting the research down.

And maybe liability on the offending party?

I agree. We should start looking at Anthony Fauci himself, who most likely pushed for this type of research via his influence at the NIAID/NIH [0].

[0] https://thebulletin.org/2021/05/the-origin-of-covid-did-peop...

Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#93

Post by ChemSpider »

Dah00n wrote: post #80
tick_tock_tick wrote: post #8

As it takes longer and longer to find any evidence in nature a lab leaking is becoming the most likely source.

That may be but we have hardly started looking yet. We haven't even found a source of SARS from 2002 yet.. > "... no direct progenitor of SARS-CoV was found in bat populations despite 15 years of searching..." https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7097006/#!po=11... Edit: Added source.

Wrong. A likely Sars1 origin was found within months. For Sars2 Chinese researches sampled 40000 animals (according to WHO report) and found nothing.

Sars1: Prof. Zheng-Li Shi from Wuhan Institute of Virology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Prof. Shu-Yi Zhang from the Institute of Zoology, and some researchers from Australia also tracked the source of SARS virus to bats, and their findings were published in Science in September 2005

Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#94

Post by AndrewBissell »

marcosdumay wrote: post #84
AndrewBissell wrote: post #59

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this virus indeed came from a lab, then: a.) It was covered up, b.) The people responsible hid crucial information which could have helped contain the spread in the early days and find treatments, c.) The people assuring us that lab creation was an impossible "conspiracy theory" at the very least have egg on their face, and at worst have no credibility or were engaged in a campaign of mis/disinformation. And that'…

Ok, those are 3 very different points, so: > It was covered up This is not actionable. > The people responsible hid crucial information which could have helped contain the spread in the early days and find treatments You imply in punishing those people? In the case it was a leak, the people interested in punishing them don't have that power, the people with that power were the same suppressing the information, so no,…

> What we should do is take a good new look at the containment procedures of those labs, reevaluate them, verify if they are followed and fix what is not.

Who should do that, exactly? The same people you seem to think we should not to attempt to investigate or hold accountable in any way?

> We should also press uncooperative countries, like China, to open those up for inspection.

If China was demanding to have a bunch of their inspectors let into Fort Detrick to poke around, we wouldn't be any more welcoming than they have been. It's silly to allow imperial powers to engage in bioweapons research and then expect them to show each other all their cards.

Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#95

Post by ProjectArcturis »

elliekelly wrote: post #31
screye wrote: post #22

Shekhar Gupta (One of India's foremost journalists and media people) did a great 30 minute analysis of this article covering who the cast members are and how this ties back into various stories from the last year. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OlO8sKRynBY So far, the lab origin story sounds the most plausible and has the least holes in it. Now innocent until proven guilty is a thing, but is not like the PRC would e…

Since there isn’t any evidence for either scenario I don’t think it’s at all accurate to say one possible origin is “the most plausible”. A lack of evidence for one does not give credence to the other and vice versa.

To say that "there isn't any evidence for either scenario" is willful ignorance.

Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#96

Post by johncena33 »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #3

Part of me thinks that we should almost not waste the time to find out. Spend the effort on preparing for the next one, by improving air filtration etc. Politics is too deeply entrenched, it will be an impossibility to uncover the truth.

Yes. By that logic, why start punishing people for vehicular manslaughter? Just spend the effort on educating perpretrators so that they don't kill someone next time.

Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#97

Post by dougmwne »

mensetmanusman wrote: post #3

Part of me thinks that we should almost not waste the time to find out. Spend the effort on preparing for the next one, by improving air filtration etc. Politics is too deeply entrenched, it will be an impossibility to uncover the truth.

That viewpoint basically amounts to head in the sand. There is a plausible pathway to determine the origin. The lab could be openly investigated and the natural environment could be combed for an ancestor. If this was an unintentional release, it would vastly change the public perception and oversight protocols around pathogen research. Think what Chernobyl, Three Mile Island and Fukushima did to nuclear energy.

If we don't get open cooperation from China, it's also extremely useful information and helps all other nations recalibrate their levels of trust and ties.

Because if a future lab release happens, it could be so, so much worse. If it seems impossible, disease was a contributing factor in 31 species' extinctions that we know of, and those diseases were of natural origin.[1] The Plague of Justinian, also of natural origin, is estimated to have killed up to half the world's population at the time. After the last year, can we really afford to take these risks lightly anymore?

[1] https://www.google.com/url?sa=t&source=web&rct=j&url=https:/...

Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#98

Post by adrianb »

slowmovintarget wrote: post #77
tomjen3 wrote: post #56

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If experts can make a decent argument that the lab escape is the most likely scenario, then the PRC can choose to let us have access to the data, or look 100% guilty and be treated accordingly.

No, all the choices have already been made. The data have already been destroyed. The Wuhan lab where this research was taking place also had a leadership change, and is now run by someone in the military. That happened in March or April of 2020, IIRC. Chinese researchers and journalists disappeared in that time frame (their work was deleted from online archives, their names removed from public employment listings...…

> if you made statements like "this started in Wuhan, in the lab there, not in the animal market next to it," you were called racist, even though race had nothing to do with it.

Honestly I always felt like "a scientist working with dangerous pathogens had an accident" is way less racist than "someone ate a weird animal from a wet market"... And yet the backlash was stronger for the lab leak scenario, almost as if the opinions were influenced by someone.

Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#99

Post by searine »

tristanj wrote: post #25

Not surprising at all considering Wuhan Lab scientists admitted on video they were bitten by bats and they had lax to no safety standards. https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/4102619 > A video released two years before the start of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic shows Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) scientists being cavalier toward protective equipment and being bitten by bats that carry deadly viruses such as SA…

>That provides a plausible origin scenario of the pandemic

Plausible but it gets us no closer to the truth unfortunately. There are many plausible origins, but it is important we do not mistake plausible for the most likely.

I agree though, the CCP has massively hindered this search for truth and will likely continue to do so, all to save face.

Re: More Scientists Urge Broad Inquiry into Coronavirus Origins

#100

Post by splithalf »

tristanj wrote: post #25

Not surprising at all considering Wuhan Lab scientists admitted on video they were bitten by bats and they had lax to no safety standards. https://www.taiwannews.com.tw/en/news/4102619 > A video released two years before the start of the Wuhan coronavirus pandemic shows Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) scientists being cavalier toward protective equipment and being bitten by bats that carry deadly viruses such as SA…

The innocent have nothing to hide.
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