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Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

telegraph.co.uk

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Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#471

Post by mandmandam »

mandmandam wrote: post #373
seanmcdirmid wrote: post #308

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But they explicitly told us that at the time: “don’t rush out and buy masks, we don’t have enough for healthcare workers as it is, you don’t need them more than they do.” The right just took some sound bites and excerpted the rest of the discussion to “prove” that Fauci was lying, while everyone else was rolling their eyes, and still are. People hear the things that support the story they want to believe, and then ig…

Quoted post unavailable.

https://www.huffpost.com/entry/scientists-react-to-cdc-coron...

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/fauci-said-masks-not-reall...

Some trivially obtainable evidence from mainstream outlets, for the silent downvoters trying to memory hole these facts.

Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#472

Post by hkt »

scott_w wrote: post #228
bryanrasmussen wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

dishonesty in the Telegraph in this case might be caused by scientific illiteracy, that is to say they might honestly have thought that their selective quotations were a reflecting the message of the longer quote. Or maybe I'm being too lenient in attributing to incompetence and not malice here.

In other papers, perhaps, but the Telegraph famously hired (now PM) Boris Johnson who cut his teeth making up stories about the “evils” of the EU. I’m going to struggle to trust such an outlet.

It may have been credible once, but now it is just Pravda for conservatives. Nothing of value is left.

Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#473

Post by michaelt »

toyg wrote: post #384
CreepGin wrote: post #377

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As an Asian American, this baffles me a little bit. We knew the virus was airborne since January 2020. It was all over Chinese/Taiwanese/SEA news outlets. I live in New England, Asians here started wearing masks months before others. I remember purposely choosing to go to Asian Supermarkets instead of Stop & Shop for safety back then.

I'm Italian and the events in February and March 2020 made it very clear to me how the anglo press largely just ignores foreign sources. The "debate" about lockdown in the UK mirrored the Italian one almost day by day, with a delay of 3 weeks between here and Italy. Italian sources and discoveries were either ignored or discounted. It was like watching a child "discover" on their own how to start a fire. If they do t…

> the anglo press largely just ignores foreign sources

As I recall, one of the first things that happened in response to the pandemic was loads of our foreign correspondents either not getting sent in the first place, or getting pulled out.

For something like an earthquake or tsunami, there would be reporters on the ground filing in-person reports within days. Somewhat understandably, nobody wanted to send reporters to outbreak hotspots.

It wasn't until further into the pandemic that journalists decided interviewing randos from their living rooms over skype was good enough.

Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#474

Post by chimprich »

baobabKoodaa wrote: post #462
chimprich wrote: post #435

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> All presumably to save a mask shortage I don't think so. There seemed to be genuine uncertainty early on in the pandemic about whether masks would be helpful. We didn't know if the virus was airborne and there was a question about whether the masks would actually be helpful. For example, the masks could have had very low benefit but encouraged people to touch their face more. Whitty in March 2020: "In terms of wear…

> There seemed to be genuine uncertainty early on in the pandemic Among the civilian population, perhaps. Not among politicians and health officials. At least Fauci, WHO, and Finnish health authorities HAVE come out afterwards and admitted that they lied about masks to conserve them for health personnel.

> At least Fauci, WHO, and Finnish health authorities HAVE come out afterwards and admitted that they lied about masks

This is not true. I think Fauci etc. admitted that a reason masks weren't recommended early on was partly to conserve masks. That's quite different from the claim that they actively lied about them.

Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#475

Post by aix1 »

jokethrowaway wrote: post #427
toyg wrote: post #384

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I'm Italian and the events in February and March 2020 made it very clear to me how the anglo press largely just ignores foreign sources. The "debate" about lockdown in the UK mirrored the Italian one almost day by day, with a delay of 3 weeks between here and Italy. Italian sources and discoveries were either ignored or discounted. It was like watching a child "discover" on their own how to start a fire. If they do t…

The UK has been one of the freest countries in terms of restrictions. I wasn't happy with the restrictions but they never went as crazy as the rest of Europe. Overall I'm glad we had Boris and not someone from the other side who would have been even more draconian - even if having a real conservative would have been better.

Which countries do you have in mind when you say "rest of Europe"? For example, Switzerland (one country I've been following pretty closely) seems have had less strict restrictions than the UK pretty much throughout the pandemic.

(To be clear, I'm not qualified to say which is a better approach, I'm just curious about your comparison.)

Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#476

Post by Veen »

jacquesm wrote: post #396
brigandish wrote: post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What would that evidence look like? The House Committee on Oversight and Reform have a press release with more detail[1], which the Telegraph mentions - it's how I found it - and you can download a pdf which contains the partially redacted emails. It doesn't seem to me that the Telegraph has misled anyone regarding this news at all. Perhaps you could read it and be more precise as to where you think they're providing…

Evidence that would convince an independent panel of people trained in the field that it confirms a lab leak. Given the odds against that evidence would likely have to be fairly hard.

The article is not about whether there was a lab leak, but whether scientists believed a lab leak was a possibility and chose to deny that belief for non-scientific political reasons. The article makes no claim at all about whether there was a lab leak, which would indeed require the level of evidence you suggest.

Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#477

Post by krageon »

iqanq wrote: post #457
kennywinker wrote: post #340

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I didn’t think I had to cite sources, since it’s been incredibly well covered but if you want to get started down a dark road here’s a link to the top hit on duckduckgo https://nypost.com/2020/08/28/chinas-260-concentration-camps... The general lack of action by governments and corporations means a casual reader must conclude nobody with any power cares, since they’re all getting rich off china.

That article doesn't say much to me. They've found... buildings? And how do they know what goes on in them?

It's mostly witness accounts from people they claim have been in there, frequently people the Chinese government says are terrorists. There's a natural friction there which makes it clear that there's definitely a group unhappy with the Chinese government (and vice-versa), but it's very hard to not just devolve into outrage porn while looking around for what goes on.

Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#478

Post by hkt »

hoseja wrote: post #225
sol_invictus wrote: post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Quoted post unavailable.

Hints at where the support for that ideology originates from.

That "ideology" originates in the US, namely in black communities that have been marginalised since slavery. No need for conspiracy theories about China somehow causing wokeness and antiracism.

Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#479

Post by edumucelli »

I have read this (https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/06/the-lab-leak-theory-...) about the origins of Covid and one phrase that called my attention was:

"Dr. Richard Ebright, board of governors professor of chemistry and chemical biology at Rutgers University, said that from the very first reports of a novel bat-related coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan, it took him “a nanosecond or a picosecond” to consider a link to the Wuhan Institute of Virology. Only two other labs in the world, in Galveston, Texas, and Chapel Hill, North Carolina, were doing similar research. “It’s not a dozen cities,” he said. “It’s three places.”"

Re: Scientists believed Covid leaked from Wuhan lab, but feared debate could hurt

#480

Post by raxxorrax »

cocoggu wrote: post #458
rozab wrote: post #417

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Evidence? The hypothesis of the article is that certain scientists did believe a lab leak was likely, but hid their views. The article provides ample evidence for this. If you also want it to conclusively prove the lab leak hypothesis in the same breath then I'd say your expectations are too high. Better publications have tackled the subject anyway: https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2021/06/the-lab-leak-theory-...

Then the title of the article is highly misleading. Using "Scientists" instead of "Some scientists" implies that the great majority of the scientists believed in this hypothesis, and there is no evidence for that.

And you would make the same criticism against articles that denied it could have had a lab origin? At some point people don't believe you anymore.
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