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The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

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Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#851

I think the real point that no public figure is willing to say, is that if this virus did leak out of a CCP lab after being modified the entire world will to some degree or another demand consequences for the CCP. While doubtful the consequences would lead to nuclear war that’s not outside the scope of possible outcomes. What’s more likely is the vast consumer public rejecting the relationship with the CCP, leading t…

Go ahead and Vote me down , it’s still true https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/lab-leak-china-intern...

Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#852
post #625

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why wouldn't you? All the research is ( supposed to be ) shared with the world anyway. If you're interested in a topic, and some other country is also interested, and they have a lab ready to go - why not throw some money at them to study your thing? Cheaper than building your own lab - especially when the phenomenon is regional.

How could you ever expect the CCP to be even remotely honest in any “share this with the world” R/D scenario?

Because they are competing on a vaguely equal footing with all the other researchers around the world. Funders want published results in return for funding, and will typically give funding to the researchers that have the perceived highest chance of publishing results if given the money. This incentivises researchers to publish anything they can. It means that money gets sent to China if it looks like the Chinese researchers are likely to make good use of it and return results. That's how academia works.

Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#853
post #587

The amount of wildly delusional oppression complex in this thread is staggering, HN has really gone downhill. On the media 'not taking it seriously' - because there was no evidence whatsoever outside of conjecture and it was being pushed heavily by misinfo merchants. No grand conspiracy. Skepticism is a good default approach to take for info heavily pushed by such sources with no solid evidence. There were tons of ar…

You must not have been paying attention. Here's one case of someone stating the true goals of those who promote the lab leak hypothesis is to promote anti Asian sentiments... https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26547263 It's hard to believe how one can reach such a daft conclusion. There are many others.

> anti Asian sentiments

I think an unintentional lab leak is going to create less issues for Asians than the other theory of "dirty" Asians eating bats, don't you think?

Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#854

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Gain of function research outside of hyper-secure settings is, frankly, idiotic. It’s massively more dangerous than criticality experiments because of the potential for exponential spread.

From the beginning gain of function research has been done at levels as low as BSL-2, and this article claims the Bat Lady said that all their coronavirus research prior to the pandemic was done at BSL-2 or -3 levels. The Wuhan Institute of Virology's BSL-4 lab would likely be booked up for research known to be very dangerous, and as you go up in levels it's more and more inconvenient to get anything done from the ph…

Plus it appears that the lab was poorly run: She noted that a September 2019 paper in an academic journal by the director of the WIV’s BSL-4 laboratory, Yuan Zhiming, had outlined safety deficiencies in China’s labs. “Maintenance cost is generally neglected,” he had written. “Some BSL-3 laboratories run on extremely minimal operational costs or in some cases none at all.”

Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#855
post #2

This is the most shocking article I have ever read in my life. I'd ask everyone to please read it because it is incredible. One thing I did not realize is that US researchers who conducted gain of function research tried to downplay and discredit the possibility of the virus originating from the wuhan lab. There was an anti-lab theory Lancet statement signed by scientists, and "Daszak had not only signed but organize…

What is even more shocking is that the mass media and big tech have done everything to keep this covered. Most of the revelations are nothing new if you read alternative news sources where true journalism still exists. Big tech and mass media are now more like China state television, they decide what and how to tell you something based on what they want you to believe. The greatest threat of our times is not the Coro…

What alternative news sources would you say are more reliable and truthful?

Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#856

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If this is the most shocking article you have ever read in your life, I feel you haven't read many articles in your life. There is absolutely no evidence in it. Just a pile of conjecture. It is absolutely the stuff of conspiracy theories. The truly shocking thing is that world does not hold China liable for this disaster. It really doesn't matter if it started in a lab or in one of their wet markets; it was incompete…

The origin does matter. If it evolved in a lab, it is highly likely that the virus is better at infecting people in lab conditions, for example that would mean inside. Which, coincidentally is exactly what we're seeing. People with masks on get infected inside buildings. Outside the risk is much much lower.

> If it evolved in a lab, it is highly likely that the virus is better at infecting people in lab conditions, for example that would mean inside.

Zoonotic diseases jump from animal to human regularly. Countless recommendations from health organizations around the world warned about and predicted a zoonotic disease event base around one of these wet markets.

> If it evolved in a lab, it is highly likely that the virus is better at infecting people in lab conditions, for example that would mean inside.

Feels like you pulled that out of your ass. Random is random and evolution is a thing. The fact that covid is effective at infecting people means only that, it has no definitive statement on it's origin. Yes, we know that a virus can be engineered in a lab to be more infectious, but billions of humans come in contact with billions of animals so it don't matter if the chance of natural zoonotic boundary jump is small.

Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#857

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are getting downvoted because it's muckraking. There is nothing shady about NIAID giving a (verrrry small for this type of research) grant to a foreign research lab, which is doing research about a topic of interest. That's how you ensure the U.S. government gets a copy of the results.

It isn't muckraking. Fauci has a clear conflict of interest. Further he argued in favor of GoF research while acknowledging it could lead to a pandemic. He literally wrote that in an academic paper. https://www.nationalreview.com/news/fauci-argued-benefits-of...

From Fauci's paper:

>In an unlikely but conceivable turn of events, what if that scientist becomes infected with the virus, which leads to an outbreak and ultimately triggers a pandemic? Many ask reasonable questions: given the possibility of such a scenario...

>Scientists working in this field might say – as indeed I have said – that the benefits of such experiments and the resulting knowledge outweigh the risks. It is more likely that a pandemic would occur in nature, and the need to stay ahead of such a threat is a primary reason for performing an experiment that might appear to be risky.

So the basic risk calculation Fauci is using (which is disputed by many scientists and virologists) is this:

Lives saved by GoF research > lives lost by inevitable lab leak + lives lost by inevitable natural pandemic

Gain of function research has been going on for decades now. What evidence is there that this research has actually served its purpose to help save lives? Did GoF help us at all with the current pandemic?

Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#858
post #837

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Couldn’t we ... just... check? Like maybe the UN or the group of 7 or something similar? China could have been forthright from the start (regardless if this was a lab-leak or not), but they weren't, and you can't make them.

In all honesty, why would they be? Without them addressing anything, the west, particularly the U.S., has had their pitchforks out and ready since day one. With our idiotic president calling it the Chinese virus from the start, why in the hell would China want to be upfront about what they knew about the origin if it indeed was a lab leak? I wouldn’t. That’s all on the assumption that they themselves even knew or kno…

Plus, China gets to watch their political enemies tear each other apart over this issue, so there really isn't any incentive to be forthright.

Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#859
post #587

The amount of wildly delusional oppression complex in this thread is staggering, HN has really gone downhill. On the media 'not taking it seriously' - because there was no evidence whatsoever outside of conjecture and it was being pushed heavily by misinfo merchants. No grand conspiracy. Skepticism is a good default approach to take for info heavily pushed by such sources with no solid evidence. There were tons of ar…

> On the media 'not taking it seriously' - because there was no evidence whatsoever outside of conjecture and it was being pushed heavily by misinfo merchants.

Virtually none of the evidence being discussed here, aside from 3 workers at the lab getting sick in November, is new. Its all the same info that has been available for well over a year. And much of it not coming from "misinfo merchants".

> Skepticism is a good default approach to take for info heavily pushed by such sources with no solid evidence.

This cuts both ways. There have been many who haven't been saying that the lab-leak is definitively the source of the virus, but simply saying that its a credible possibility with at least as much evidence as any other theory, and should therefore be investigated. Throughout the last year, it was pretty consistently called a conspiracy theory or "debunked", when clearly it was neither. Declaring something to be misinformation when it is not, isn't any more skeptical that declaring something to be the truth with no evidence.

You can try and poo-poo all you want, but that doesn't change the fact that the mainstream narrative, both on social media and in the mainstream media, has been wildly off about this for over a year, and virtually nothing has changed from an evidence perspective to warrant their about face. The general narrative was simply wrong, due to a combination of hubris, partisanship, and lack of skepticism.

Re: The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

#860

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's been highlighted of the FOIA released emails so far suggests he didn't know if his NIAID was funding Wuhan Institute of Virology SARS type coronavirus gain of function experiments, but he was quite concerned that might be the case. Look for the one where he tells someone to keep his cell phone on. It's something he'd likely be concerned about, because he's been a big booster of gain of function research, and t…

The email trail is damning. Fauci knew that the possibility was there. Instead of pushing for discovery and transparency of what actually happened, he publicly and vehemently denied the possibility and gave fuel to those who wanted to call the "lab leak theory" people "conspiracy nuts". Fauci's elevation to sainthood was way too premature. His constant media appearances where he hasn't been questioned on any of this…

The bar is really low if the person helps push the narrative.
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