Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research • Hacker News Board

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#151

Post by cbsmith » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:14 PM UTC

gustavus wrote: post #82

avar wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's the completely reasonable compromise of continuing to conduct this research at an isolated Antarctic station, at a quarantined oil platform etc. Instead these labs are all near major population centers, with researchers freely mixing with the general population.

This is what I don't get, why is this all happenning in cities? Like I live in a place where one of the major employers is a government research facility and every day people go to the designated meeting point and a bus takes them the rest of the way, or they spend 45 minutes driving on a dirt road to the middle of nowhere to keep anything from work (in this case nuclear related stuff) from coming home with them. Why…

> Why the hell are we putting biological virology institutes in the middle of the major population centers instead of the middle of nowhere?

Have you looked at the answers to these questions?

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#152

Post by Wowfunhappy » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:16 PM UTC

cbsmith wrote: post #142

kosievdmerwe wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I literally can't think of a more dangerous kind of research that we could be doing as a species than messing around and making viruses more dangerous. If we really have to do it, then we can do it in the middle of a desert with quarantine procedures instead of near/in population centers.

> I literally can't think of a more dangerous kind of research that we could be doing as a species than messing around and making viruses more dangerous. You have a very limited imagination. ;-) I assure you that extensive research into biological (not involving viruses), chemical, and nuclear weapons... and really a wide variety of weapons research is easily more dangerous. There's plenty of opportunity in other are…

I assume the biological samples need to get transported at some point anyway. The researchers would need to live on-site. Yes this would dramatically increase the cost.

Personally, I think we just shouldn't do this at all.

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#153

Post by improv » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:16 PM UTC

kazinator wrote: post #144

tastyfreeze wrote: post #51

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gain of function research is the kind of experiment that could develop a disease that kills billions. It isn't a game we should be playing lightly if at all. The argument is that eventually biology could make the same mutation. The thing is, it is extremely unlikely that Ebola becomes air born naturally, for example. But that is the kind of thing that gain of function seeks to develop, you know, just in case.

> kills billions That would either save the planet, or go a long way in that direction.

George Carlin - Saving the Planet

https://youtu.be/7W33HRc1A6c?si=-EGHs1UFrx3s3io5

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#154

Post by Wowfunhappy » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:17 PM UTC

dist-epoch wrote: post #128

fabian2k wrote: post #11

One thing the pandemic certainly has shown is just how dangerous an otherwise unremarkable animal virus can be if it gains the ability to infect humans. Simply because nobody has a pre-existing immunity it gains enormous advantages in its ability to spread compared to similar viruses that are already endemic. I think previous candidates for new pandemic viruses did mislead us as those never got far enough to become a…

During SARS-Cov2 the flu basically disappeared because of all the masks and hand sanitizer, given that the flu is much less contagious and harder to spread. That gives me hope regarding H1N1, if it happens, we might be able to keep it under control.

We'd also be able to develop a vaccine much more quickly. We're very good at making flu vaccines because we do it every year. That's why we had a 2009 "swine flu" vaccine within a few months.

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#155

Post by [deleted] » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:19 PM UTC

akira2501 wrote: post #67

fabian2k wrote: post #11

One thing the pandemic certainly has shown is just how dangerous an otherwise unremarkable animal virus can be if it gains the ability to infect humans. Simply because nobody has a pre-existing immunity it gains enormous advantages in its ability to spread compared to similar viruses that are already endemic. I think previous candidates for new pandemic viruses did mislead us as those never got far enough to become a…

> Simply because nobody has a pre-existing immunity There is good evidence that those who had SARS-CoV-1 had immunity that covered SARS-CoV-2. This immunity lasted for more than a decade. > What I found scary about SARS-CoV2 is just how much it improved between variants. Perhaps a leaky spike only vaccine was a particularly bad choice and the extent to which it drove these variants is not clear. There is additional d…

[deleted]

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#156

Post by kosievdmerwe » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:20 PM UTC

cbsmith wrote: post #142

kosievdmerwe wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I literally can't think of a more dangerous kind of research that we could be doing as a species than messing around and making viruses more dangerous. If we really have to do it, then we can do it in the middle of a desert with quarantine procedures instead of near/in population centers.

> I literally can't think of a more dangerous kind of research that we could be doing as a species than messing around and making viruses more dangerous. You have a very limited imagination. ;-) I assure you that extensive research into biological (not involving viruses), chemical, and nuclear weapons... and really a wide variety of weapons research is easily more dangerous. There's plenty of opportunity in other are…

> I assure you that extensive research into biological (not involving viruses), chemical, and nuclear weapons... and really a wide variety of weapons research is easily more dangerous.

They very much are not.

Viruses and bacteria are unique in the fact that they can harm the whole globe as opposed to chemical and other disasters that will likely only harm the immediate area.

And harming the whole globe is all the more certain for infectious diseases if you put them in the middle of a large city with lots of air travel.

> Now you'll want to have an ultra-secure means of transporting highly dangerous biological samples, not to mention research teams & observers, at very high speeds to the middle of a desert. Are you sure you've improved the risk profile?

Why would you need to transport things at high speed for speculative research involving newly generated viruses/bacteria?

I never said anything about analysing things involving people who are actively infected, but there the disease is already out in the public, so the risk profile is completely different.

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#157

Post by mardifoufs » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:21 PM UTC

RandomLensman wrote: post #125

mardifoufs wrote: post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Uh? It's basically what everyone believes almost everywhere I went. In North Africa for sure, in Canada it's a bit less common but still extremely widespread. So I'm not sure you meant by it being a US only phenomenon? If anything it's actually a pretty divisive debate in the US,.

Who are you talking to? No-one I speak to in Europe cares but some US media do, though. Some niche circles might in Europe, but then there are hobbyist for everything.

https://pro.morningconsult.com/instant-intel/covid-19-lab-le...

There you go, France, the UK, Italy and Spain all have a higher proportion (or even a majority) of people believing in the lab leak theory than in the US. Germany is very close too.

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#158

Post by cbsmith » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:22 PM UTC

rurp wrote: post #141

tootie wrote: post #116

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Everyone in this thread seems awfully convinced. There is as of yet no proof that's the case. Nor that GoF created the strain. Both are just conjecture. Seems pretty foolish to end valuable research to appease people who fear things they don't understand.

We don't know if the virus came from a market either, so why would that be the default position? Especially since that position requires accepting a hell of a coincidence that the virus just happened to emerge near a lab working on gain of function research for that type of virus. China's lack of openness to investigating this should also skew us against giving them the benefit of the doubt, rather than the opposite.…

It's not a court case. There's not a burden of proof.

What there is, is a risk analysis, which means you have to consider the risks of any particular action as well as in NOT taking the action. I've seen literally no discussion about the risks of NOT taking the action.

I'm reminded of self-driving cars, because we're worried they might lead to the deaths of thousands of people each year. Meanwhile, over a million people die each year in car accidents. Conclusion: best to let those million people die each year.

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#159

Post by improv » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:23 PM UTC

dkarl wrote: post #118

avar wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

There's the completely reasonable compromise of continuing to conduct this research at an isolated Antarctic station, at a quarantined oil platform etc. Instead these labs are all near major population centers, with researchers freely mixing with the general population.

That's a completely reasonable compromise. I think the reason it doesn't get mentioned is that nobody would bother doing it under those constraints. Scientists would not choose to work on it at such great personal cost, and the financial cost would mean that other kinds of research would be better uses of money.

There are plenty of people who work in remote locations like Antarctica, and few if any of them make such grandiose claims as these virologists who think their work will save millions of lives.

If they can't be bothered to work in a safely remote location then they don't actually believe in their work and are blind to the risks and history of lab leaks.

Re: Lab leak fight casts chill over virology research

#160

Post by cbsmith » Tue, Oct 17, 2023, 9:24 PM UTC

jrm4 wrote: post #26

xracy wrote: post #16

I get that there are a lot of arm-chair experts who think this was a lab-leak. But we're making many large jumps here from: Was this created in a lab? Was this leaked from a lab? Is there something inherently dangerous about studying viruses in labs? Full NIMBY. The positive externalities of this are good jobs around virology study to try and prevent the next pandemic. But we're just leaning super hard into fear-mong…

Yeah, nah. You're conflating certainty with risk. Crazy virus comes from where said crazy viruses are literally made and studied. Occams Razor suggests a lot, but more importantly, smart risk management dictates that you treat the lab as if it is the source; absent some sort of clear risk-related reason that these experiments are likely to do more good than harm. So I suppose the correct question is -- what are we ge…

> Crazy virus comes from where said crazy viruses are literally made and studied.

"Crazy" is an odd characterization, but let's go with it. Where are "crazy viruses literally made"? Well, more often than not, in nature. So...