Origins of SarsCoV-2 virus, does it matter & why?

[elbows]

Greater analysis of the failings of the press and sections of the scientific community are warranted. I've seen a handful of examples so far such as the following one, but I'm also aware that the authors are often coming from a political direction which is very, very different to my own, and have their own very different reasons for being willing to explore some of this territory.

Opinion | Media Groupthink and the Lab-Leak Theory (Published 2021)

Sometimes the most destructive enemies of science are those who claim to speak in its name.

www.nytimes.com

 

[Yossarian]

Despite what I said earlier, I'd still strongly recommend that people beware of anyone who is keen to reach a conclusion. Come to terrms with the uncertainty.

That LA times article is pretty fucking shit too, feeble. 'Scientific consensus' my arse, and the u-turn that the media and authorities had to indulge in a while back was a good demonstration that pathetic calls to back an imaginary scientific consensus are bogus and discredited, a simplistic trick that failed, not up to this task.

It's the latest in a long line of columns from Hiltzik at the LA Times dismissing the lab-leak theory - he seems awfully sure of himself for a financial journalist who isn't bringing any scientific background of his own to the table.

Daniel Engber at the Atlantic is leaning toward the market theory but he definitely takes a much more nuanced view:

Those inclined to think, like Worobey, that the pandemic must have started from a traded wild animal share a fundamental intuition with those who point their fingers at the lab: They’ve both looked at all the facts and then identified a grand coincidence, and they both believe that their theory—and only their theory—can explain it....

...One coincidence may seem bigger than the other, and thus more likely to reflect the true origins of COVID-19. I tend to think that the market theory has a bit more heft, based on what we know right now—but what we know right now remains limited to disclosures by Chinese authorities. This much is clear: Both circumstantial cases, for a laboratory origin and for a market spillover, have been made in the absence of crucial evidence that might very well exist.

The Lab-Leak Theory Meets Its Perfect Match

Both pandemic-origin arguments depend on coincidence.

www.theatlantic.com

He adds:

China may well have an interest in withholding evidence for both pandemic-origin theories. (After all, each implies official negligence in its own way.) In other words, we could be stuck in a circumstantial stalemate. If one of these big coincidences is pointing toward the truth, what are the odds that we’ll ever find out?

 

[_Russ_]

Apologies for the source but added for reference: Covid 'possibly engineered and probably leaked from lab'

(BTW for your own sanity don't ever read the comments section of this rag)

 

[StoneRoad]

Although it would be, for the sake of completeness, to uncover / determine the source of the SarsCoV-2 virus, I don't think we will ever know for absolutely certain. For one thing too much time has passed, as actually identifying the true "patient zero" may never happen - even if they think that they have.

Personally, I do not know whether either the market or the lab are to "blame" --- either separately or in some combination / proportion. There might even be one or more factors involved about which we know nothing.

 

[zahir]

Unclear if we will ever find out the full extent to which Chan who features in that article was right or wrong, but she is certainly my kind of human. I value the gadfly and such things come naturally to me. I doubt she got everything right, and I dont buy into every avenue she explored, but I think she went about it in mostly the right way.

Here's a podcast with Alina Chan talking about the search for the origins of the virus.

 

[elbows]

Thanks, I will watch that in the coming days when I find the time.

Partly because I did read some criticisms of her efforts since I made some earlier posts praising her attitude, that make me wonder whether I will have to somewhat reconsider my opinion on her stance and approach. I have little idea of what to expect, so I dont have a prediction about whether I'll actually find cause to change my tune or not, and that video will probably help.

 

[zahir]

It isn't the slickest podcast, more of a chat between people who do science. But maybe there are things that come across because of that.

 

[elbows]

Thats cool, I like informal chat formats more generally, cheers.

 

[NoXion]

I've never considered the lab leak hypothesis to be outside the realms of plausibility. Viruses are studied and shit happens. I think anyone dismissing the possibility entirely is being foolish.

What I think most people are objecting to is the notion that it was a deliberate release as part of a diabolical plan by an ancient conspiracy of Illuminati masterminds to reshape the world according to their whims. That's batshit.

I don't know anywhere near enough to favour one hypothesis over any other. The wet market hypothesis also seems plausible.

 

[zahir]

Another podcast with Alina Chan talking about the lab leak hypothesis.

 

[zahir]

Interview with Alina Chan

How Did the COVID-19 Pandemic Start?

Dr. Alina Chan has been one of the most prominent commentators on the origins of COVID-19. Here, she explains why the binary of “natural origin” versus “lab leak” is misleading and simplistic.

www.currentaffairs.org

 

[zahir]

A report on the Wuhan Institute of Virology that plays down the lab leak theory.

Meet the scientist at the center of the covid lab leak controversy

Shi Zhengli has spent years at the Wuhan Institute of Virology researching coronaviruses that live in bats. Her work has come under fire as the world tries to understand where covid-19 came from.

www.technologyreview.com

 

[weltweit]

Fascinating article zahir but boy is it long

 

[elbows]

It does a pretty good job of highlighting all the uncertainties, potential red herrings, real issues about biosafety in general and the pushback that these subjects often lead to, especially from vested interests.

Its complex stuff and ends up leading me back to my usual conclusion - its better to keep an open mind and resist coming to any conclusions. There is always a chance that an important missing piece of the picture will be found, but I wouldnt put any money on it. In the absence of solid or compelling conclusions, tackle all the possible risk vectors in future, including all the animal-human interfaces which still very much includes lab work of various kinds.

Nor can I even begin to explore the murky world of weapons-related research. An utterly impenetrable subject which can easily raise suspicions devoid of any substance that we can grasp properly or make sensible use of. And theres no point in me talking about it beyond mentioning the possibility that it exists. And even raising the possibility will lead to derision in all the usual ways, understandable but infuriating all the same. I dont want to join bogus dots, and so am left with nowhere to go at all on this, apart from feeling the need to poit out that there is a branch of scientific research that is off-limits to mainstream discussion, and that in that world of shadows there are no shortage of opportunities for people to fill the gap with utter bullshit. And to be clear I'm only mentioning it in connection with the world of lab research and how these subjects are discussed, not deliberate release.

 

[zahir]

Review of Alina Chan and Matt Ridley's book Viral

Book review – Viral: The Search for the Origin of COVID-19

Though a natural spillover has long been the preferred explanation for the origin of COVID-19, Viral is a disconcerting book that convinces there are plenty of red flags to take seriously the possi…

inquisitivebiologist.com

But enough of other people’s opinions, what do I make of this book? Viral ends up being the written equivalent of a Rorschach test: you can read into it what you like. Those inclined to conspiracy theories will find plenty to say “told you so”. If, like me, you are on the fence, you will likely stay there. And those who disavow the lab leak scenario might judge the book one big nothing-burger that fails to convince. This, by the way, is not a criticism of the authors. This, as they patiently show here, is the current state of play. When the pandemic started, my gut instinct was to assume zoonosis (I even reviewed Quammen’s Spillover and sent a copy to my mum), but picking favourites is not how science works. With time, I have become less sure. Viral confirms that, though there is no solid evidence in favour of either scenario, there are many disconcerting red flags to take seriously the possibility of a lab leak.

 

[elbows]

I like that review because as is probably rather obvious by now, I think fence-sitting is the reasonable stance to take on this one. A such I am not exactly desperate to read the book, because its not really going to add much to my understanding or shift my position.

 

[platinumsage]

There’s a summary of the coincidence at the end of this Spectator article criticising a dodgy BBC headline:

Has the lab leak theory really been disproved?

The BBC carried a story this week with the headline ‘Covid origin studies say evidence points to Wuhan market’. Bizarrely the paper in Science they are referring to, by Michael Worobey and colleagues, says no such thing. It says: ‘the observation that the preponderance of early cases were linked...

www.spectator.co.uk

“Most serious scientists agree that this virus probably came from bats on the borders of Yunnan and Laos. The question is and always has been: how did the virus get to Wuhan from bats living more than a thousand miles to the south-west, a distance as great as London to Rome?

One possibility is the wildlife trade, but far less wildlife is sold in Wuhan than in Guangdong in southern China, and yet the virus appeared only in Wuhan: where are the other outbreaks among wildlife traders. The other possibility is that it was scientists who brought it to Wuhan. Why do we think this still needs discussing? Here are six good reasons.

1. Wuhan is the site of the most intensive programme of research on SARS-like viruses in the world

2. That programme involved bringing hundreds of SARS-like viruses to Wuhan

3. Most of them were brought by scientists from Yunnan and some from Laos

4. Among those viruses was one that was 96.2 per cent the same as SARS-CoV-2

5. They refuse to open up their database showing what other viruses they brought and they published the results of experiments in which they manipulated the genomes of these viruses in ways that sometimes made them much more infectious

6. They published plans to insert into a SARS-like virus the very kind of genomic sequence that SARS-CoV-2 has and no other SARS-like virus has.

None of this is a smoking gun, but it’s a heck of a coincidence.”

 

[Thesaint]

Another reason to look into the lab leak is any rogue nation with a bio lab would know they could release something and it would never be investigated.
Quite how something from near Laos ended up 'exploding' so far away is suspicious and worthy of explanation.

 

[elbows]

There’s a summary of the coincidence at the end of this Spectator article criticising a dodgy BBC headline:

Thanks for finding that.

I did read both the papers the BBC story was referring to the other day. They were interesting in places but they didnt really fill in many useful gaps, they couldnt compensate for missing evidence. And the one that was focussed on analysing case locations didnt impress me much because by their own admission there were a lot of early cases that they didnt have the exact location for, and so I was left wondering things such as if an obvious cluster of cases would also appear on the other side of the river if all that extra data was available. The other study was interesting in terms of looking at two early strains and trying to deduce timing and chain of events, but its still glorified guesswork and trying to compensate for a lack of patient zero/missing link sample from an animal etc.

The BBC article ended with this quote:

The major risk of being distracted by looking for someone in a laboratory to blame for all this, he added, "is that we run the risk of letting this happen again because we've focused on the wrong problem."

Covid origin studies say evidence points to Wuhan market

One of the researchers said he hoped the studies would correct the false theory that it came from a lab.

www.bbc.co.uk

My stance remains that due to the uncertainties about origin, actually the sensible thing to do in terms of reducing future pandemic risk is to focus on ALL of the potential vectors, all of the animal-human interfaces that have theoretical pandemic potential. That includes wet markets, but it also still includes a bunch of lab research activities. Even if a lab accident was not involved in this pandemic, such possibilities are theoretically plausible and therefore such risks need to be taken seriously. If that doesnt happen then I'm bound to make bad jokes about the risk of pandemics occurring due to humans doing ostrich impressions, a different sort of animal human interface. And what all these potential vectors and sensible mitigation of the theoretical risks have in common is that such mitigations are inconvenient to certain groups, are a threat to vested interests of one kind or another, and pose awkward questions with uncomfortable implications. Scientific research should not receive a free pass on this just because of the good work they can do. I doubt my stance would really change on this even if we were actually able to prove at some point that the market was the vector for this pandemic.

 

[elbows]

I havent had time to listen to the podcast that is the basis for this article yet:

Covid: Top Chinese scientist says don’t rule out lab leak

The man who led China's pandemic response says inquiries into its origins should consider everything.

www.bbc.co.uk

I approve of the overall theme that expressing certainty about the origin is not sensible.

 

[zahir]

Sunday Times insight report on the lab leak theory:

https://archive.ph/zRoAn

eta: I'm wary about the level of certainty suggested here.

 

[Cid]

Sunday Times insight report on the lab leak theory:

https://archive.ph/zRoAn

eta: I'm wary about the level of certainty suggested here.

That raises so many red flags it might as well be Zhongnanhai.

*the way the article is written I mean. Shall see whether more informed commentary gets written up/podcasted anywhere.

 

[Signal 11]

Some bonkers stuff in this article about a group pushing the lab leak idea along with their own failed vaccine based on it. Apparently most of the information comes from leaked/hacked emails that they dispute.

Top science journal faced secret attacks from Covid conspiracy theory group

One of the world’s most prestigious general science journals, Nature, was the target of a two-year-long sustained and virulent secret attack by a conspiratorial group of extreme Brexit lobbyists with high-level political, commercial and intelligence connections, according to documents and correspondence examined by Computer Weekly and Byline Times.
[...]
When their campaign flopped and a Covid vaccine promoted by the group failed to reach any form of clinical testing, the group arranged for unfounded accusations against Nature magazines and staff to be published by the Daily Telegraph and on other right wing news sites. They called themselves the “Covid Hunters”. Their allegations against science reporting helped fuel an explosion in “lab leak” claims on right-wing conspiracy sites.
[...]
The campaign was led by former chief of the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) Sir Richard Dearlove in conjunction with retired history academic Gwythian (Gwyn) Prins, and lobbyist John Constable of the privately funded climate change denial group Global Warming Policy Foundation. The scientific member of the group, oncologist professor Gus Dalgleish, was a prominent member of UKIP who had stood as the party’s parliamentary candidate in a south London constituency then campaigned for “Leave Means Leave”.
[...]
The alleged man-made origin of SARS-CoV-2 had “important implications for vaccine design”, Johnson was told. This meant, in the confident minds of the Covid Hunters, that only the Sørensen Vaccine – later called BioVacc-19 – was likely to work and save the world. [...] BioVacc-19, the Norwegian Covid vaccine idea promoted by the Prins-Dearlove group in 2020, flopped after failing to attract scientific interest, funding or testing.
[...]
Richard Dearlove did not respond to requests for comment. Dearlove previously told Computer Weekly that as “this is Russian origin material and not in fact the original uncontaminated material from a Proton account which carried some of my private and personal emails, it is unfortunately not possible for me to respond to your questions”.

 

[toblerone3]

A friend of mine said today that it was almost certain that Covid had been caused by a lab leak. I said that I didn't think that was quite right. However the tenor of articles seem to have shifted in that direction compared to commentary from 2020 and 2021.

 

[2hats]

Domain-relevant scientific opinion leans towards natural origin.

 

[Silas Loom]

A friend of mine said today that it was almost certain that Covid had been caused by a lab leak. I said that I didn't think that was quite right. However the tenor of articles seem to have shifted in that direction compared to commentary from 2020 and 2021.

Hanlen’s paper was 2022 IIRC. Made all the difference.