Coronavirus

Out of context: Reply #6349

  • Started
  • Last post
  • 6,399 Responses
  • Morning_star-3

    @yuekit You can't simply reject this...

    **************
    Starting in at least 2016 – and with no indication of a stop prior to the COVID-19 outbreak – WIV researchers conducted experiments involving RaTG13, the bat coronavirus identified by the WIV in January 2020 as its closest sample to SARS-CoV-2 (96.2% similar). The WIV became a focal point for international coronavirus research after the 2003 SARS outbreak and has since studied animals including mice, bats, and pangolins.

    The WIV has a published record of conducting “gain-of-function” research to engineer chimeric viruses. But the WIV has not been transparent or consistent about its record of studying viruses most similar to the COVID-19 virus, including “RaTG13,” which it sampled from a cave in Yunnan Province in 2013 after several miners died of SARS-like illness.

    WHO investigators must have access to the records of the WIV’s work on bat and other coronaviruses before the COVID-19 outbreak. As part of a thorough inquiry, they must have a full accounting of why the WIV altered and then removed online records of its work with RaTG13 and other viruses.

    **************

    I understand that there's not conclusive evidence either way but your insistence that it can't be the WIV is perplexing. You are essentially claiming that your speculation is better than any other speculation. It's all speculation. And, until (if ever) China decide to co-operate it's unlikely we'll know the truth. I can't see how you can reject one in favour of the other.

    Morning_star -3Permalink
    UpvoteDownvote
    Flag
    • These are allegations from Mike Pompeo.
      https://2017-2021.st…      yuekit
    • The Trump admin put out a lot of rumors about the lab, very few of which are true. So in this case...the RaTG13 virus they're talking about can't possibly beyuekit
    • turned into SARS-CoV-2, it's too genetically different.yuekit
    • This would be like trying to engineer a human in a lab directly from a monkey and leaving out all the actual evolution.yuekit
    • So yea there's just an ocean of BS out there on this topic, even coming from the government.yuekit
    • This is what's most remarkable about the lab leak story...not the actual lab leak but how people have managed to confuse and mislead the public through thingsyuekit
    • that sound like they're true but are wrong on some very complex technical point that undermines the whole thing.yuekit
    • That's not the point. There is information that hasn't been made available from the WIV. Given that they were collecting and studying SARS like viruses from...Morning_star
    • ...various locations throughout China which are known to jump to humans, a WIV origin can't be discounted. Or do you know something different?Morning_star
    • There are a lot of things that can't be discounted but it doesn't mean you put them on the same level as something there's hard evidence for.yuekit
    • Hard evidence? Have i missed something here. You have hard evidence that an animal from the Wet Market tested positive for SARS-CoV-2?Morning_star
    • This is where I think you're going astray...the standard of evidence is not "this thing is already 100% proven, and if it's not 100% then it's just as likelyyuekit
    • as anything else."yuekit
    • Nothing is ever proven in science, it's all about likelihood and accumulating evidence. Even if they found an infected animal you could still make some weirdyuekit
    • argument (not saying you specifically but people probably would) that it escaped from the lab and walked across the city, something like that :)yuekit
    • But that would rightfully be seen as idiotic. Is it possible? Yes. Is it likely? No.yuekit
    • And in spite of what you seem to think there's a lot of evidence for zoonotic origin, summarized here...
      https://i.imgur.com/…      yuekit
    • I understand, but no. It's more like: The origin of SARS-CoV-2 'could' be the Wet Market because we have existing examples in nature that show similar ...Morning_star
    • ...progress from animal to human and the wet market sold those animals but we have no 'hard' evidence that this was the case. The virus 'could' have come from..Morning_star
    • ...the WIV but the evidence to prove either way has been suppressed by the Chinese Government.

      I think the potential WIV origin has merit because the info...      Morning_star
    • Samples at the market are hard evidence. The CCP clearing out the animals means the failure to find the original infected animal is...what you'd expect.yuekit
    • ...has been suppressed. Why would China block access to data that could prove it wasn't the WIV?Morning_star
    • But that's not all there is to it. People who actually know about this stuff will point out SARS-CoV-2 isn't at all what you'd predict for an engineered virus.yuekit
    • When they do experiments virologists almost always use a "template" similar to how a web developer might use a framework. So the base expectationyuekit
    • is actually that it would be easy to tell it came from the lab.yuekit
    • Another point is there are two different lineages of the virus at the market from the beginning that almost certainly didn't evolve from each other.yuekit
    • They are totally separate, different versions of SARS-CoV-2 that when you look at the genetic evolution, it's difficult to see how one evolved from the other.yuekit
    • That's very difficult to explain from a lab leak but exactly what you'd expect if there was zoonotic spillover from a group of animals.yuekit
    Show [[ numHiddenNotes ]] more notesAdd Note
    SaveCancel

View thread