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CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

nytimes.com

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Re: CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

#501

Post by ajmurmann »

Retric wrote: post #355
jtc331 wrote: post #336

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem is that the two theories can have competing indications as to how to prepare. Specifically: should we do gain of function research, or is that foolish — depends on how you read what happened in 2020.

The actual future risks don’t change based on which specific origin happened. The correct response is likely to spend significantly more on doing actual research and a great deal on making sure everyone is well contained. It’s likely a good idea to locate such labs outside of highly populated areas as part of a defense in depth strategy.

What is there to research with GoF that could be worth the massive risk? We had a vaccine for COVID in a weekend. Approval and manufacturing where the bottlenecks.

Re: CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

#502

Post by ImHereToVote »

ychan268 wrote: post #257

I mean which country benefited from COVID? China controlled the virus first then lost a lot from strict lockdown, western had many death cases not to mention developing countries. If some Bie Inc made COVID, I don't think they have the courage to piss all governments.

The country with the population that has the most incompatible ACE2 receptors benefitted the most.

Re: CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

#503

Post by throwaway290 »

oneshtein wrote: post #485
theptip wrote: post #388

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The theory is quite clear, if you know which strains could hop to humans then you can prioritize monitoring them, just like we monitor influenza types in animal populations now. The problem is just that P(avert catastrophe) is fairly low, and P(create catastrophe) is substantially higher.

[flagged]

> It's not about nature. It's about biological weapons. If Russians will create a new biological weapon (they do), then we must have a cure before they will use it in their fight with NATO.

And the best solution is to research this... in China?

Re: CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

#504

Post by kukkeliskuu »

Fomite wrote: post #464
why_at wrote: post #456

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you elaborate on point 4? Your comment is interesting but I don't entirely follow.

Basically, things like "It started in Wuhan near the WIV" implies that we actually have found the first case, etc., when this is notoriously difficult to do, especially with a disease that can have mild or asymptomatic presentation.

Doesn't the same difficulty of finding the first case also apply to the wet market theory?

Re: CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

#505

Post by throwaway290 »

FeteCommuniste wrote: post #324
lolinder wrote: post #306

Can someone help me understand why a lab leak looks worse for China than zoonotic spillover? Why would Senator Cotton need it to be a lab leak to give him more leverage? From what I understand, one theory is that China has for decades tolerated unsanitary wet markets that allowed dangerous diseases to evolve, get stronger, and eventually transmit to human hosts. They'd been warned about this over and over again and h…

Because a lab leak could imply that China had a direct, active role in cultivating or engineering the virus, as opposed to the “mere” disastrous negligence entailed by the wet market theory.

> lab leak could imply that China had a direct, active role in cultivating or engineering the virus, as opposed to the “mere” disastrous negligence entailed by the wet market theory

This was literally outsourced US DoD research...

Re: CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

#506

Post by morepedantic »

cyberax wrote: post #360
CMay wrote: post #275

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The closest natural relative origin of SARS-CoV-2 was in Yunnan ~700 miles away from the market. The Wuhan lab collected samples from that area and the lab is only ~10 miles away from the market. Those wet markets are huge vectors for a viral spread, so a virus being spread there doesn't necessarily mean it started there. Why that market in Hubei and not first at a market closer to Yunnan? It might be more profitable…

> The closest The closest _known_. The second closest was found in Laos, also 700 miles from Wuhan (BANAL-52). Except it's in the other direction. So we know that close cousins of CoV-2 are pretty wide-spread. > Those wet markets are huge vectors for a viral spread, so a virus being spread there doesn't necessarily mean it started there The thing is, does it really matter? We can say with a high degree of confidence…

>We can say with a high degree of confidence that SARS-CoV-2 was _not_ engineered.

The lab leak hypothesis doesn't depend on GoF research. CoV-2 could have a natural origin, been collected by the WIV, and leaked into the city. This has happened before.

That said, there's no way to evaluate if it was engineered. Some methods of engineering are indistinguishable from natural selection, and fingerprints from detectable methods have a very short half-life in a fast mutating virus.

>So even if the very first jump was in the lab, it was likely a result of insufficient biosecurity measures.

Virtually no one is claiming otherwise. This is a weakman argument.

>and it's a matter of time until a new spillover happens.

At the start of CoV-2, everyone told me that it takes years to develop vaccines. I told them it takes days to develop and weeks to test. Turns out that I was right. If the mortality rate of CoV-2 had been 3%, like early reports suggested, then the mRNA vaccines would have been in production by March.

Re: CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

#507

Post by raziel2p »

morepedantic wrote: post #497
CMay wrote: post #154

Things that are true: "Officials said the agency was not bending its views to a new boss, and that the new assessment had been in the works for some time." The Department of Energy concluded with low confidence that it was a lab leak. The FBI concluded with moderate confidence that it was a lab leak. The CIA's new report also concludes that they have low confidence that it was a lab leak. It's important to note that…

>China covering it up is not necessarily evidence that it was a lab leak. Yes it is, but the evidence is non-specific. China will attempt to cover up 100% of lab leaks. China may attempt to cover up zoonosis. The cover up is consistent with either theory, but it is the only reaction consistent with a lab leak.

"China will attempt to cover up 100% of lab leaks. China may attempt to cover up zoonosis."

this is a blind assumption. they may just be covering up 100% of all things, especially when the international community (i.e. Trump) is trying to push/blame them.

Re: CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

#509

Post by Retric »

hn_throwaway_99 wrote: post #487
Retric wrote: post #355

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The actual future risks don’t change based on which specific origin happened. The correct response is likely to spend significantly more on doing actual research and a great deal on making sure everyone is well contained. It’s likely a good idea to locate such labs outside of highly populated areas as part of a defense in depth strategy.

> The correct response is likely to spend significantly more on doing actual research and a great deal on making sure everyone is well contained. Strongly, strongly disagree. When even a teeny risk of escape means that millions of people could die, I think a much better argument is to simply make certain types of research completely off limits. I'm certainly not the only person who thinks this. Zeynep Tufekci, who in…

Looking at risks alone always biases you to avoid doing anything.

The benefits of research here are also human lives. So doing nothing has a real cost and the benefits extend indefinitely into the future.

Suppose you’re deciding between a 1% chance of a lab leak costing 10 million lives and a 20% chance you save 50 million lives over the next 100 years. That’s heavily weighted towards doing something, while still carrying significant risk. Some people would still say the risks aren’t worth it, but it’s not an obvious decision.

Re: CIA now favors lab leak theory to explain Covid's origins

#510

Post by morepedantic »

scarab92 wrote: post #265
Leary wrote: post #191

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Things that are true: The first large cluster of infections was associated with the Huanan Seafood Market, and retrospective analyses of influenza-like-illness patients and blood donations in Wuhan found no evidence of earlier circulation. Sampling of many individuals prior to December 2019 showed no positives for SARS-CoV-2 antibodies, suggesting that the virus did not spread widely before the market outbreak. The W…

Forgive the silly question, but does the lab leak theory entail the virus being engineered in the lab, or simply sampled from nature by researchers then not adequately contained? I’m not clear on what exactly is being alleged by these agencies?

Those are both examples of a hypothetical lab leak. The WIV had the largest collection of related viruses in the world sampled from nature. The WIV performed GoF research on some of those viruses. They're both plausible events. I'm not sure how you could ever distinguish between them at this point.
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