61 ms·

Why the Wuhan lab leak theory shouldn't be dismissed

• Scoundreller 6y ago
  I’m sure everyone here can appreciate the difference between development and manufacturing. While I agree that it’s extremely unlikely that a lab developed this virus, it’s far more plausible for one to have manufactured it.
  • brippalcharrid 6y ago
    What makes you think it's "extremely unlikely" that this virus was developed in a lab, and who do you think you're agreeing with? > “It was very unlikely that anything could escape from such a place,” Ben Embarek said during the Feb. 9 WHO press conference, citing the team’s discussions with Wuhan lab officials about their safety protocols and audits. “If you look at the history of lab accidents, these are extremely rare events.” > Yet lab accidents aren’t rare. > What’s rare are accidents causing documented outbreaks. But those have happened, including in 2004 when two researchers at a lab in Beijing unknowingly became infected with another type of SARS coronavirus, sparking a small outbreak that killed one person. > In the weeks since leaving Wuhan, the WHO’s team has been questioned about its independence and depth, including by the Biden administration, amid media reports that China denied the team access to raw data on possible COVID-19 cases that were identified during the earliest part of the outbreak. > “We have deep concerns about the way in which the early findings of the COVID-19 investigation were communicated and questions about the process used to reach them,” White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in a statement last month. “It is imperative that this report be independent, with expert findings free from intervention or alteration by the Chinese government.” Why is the distinction between development and manufacturing relevant here? Have you read the article?
    • Simulacra 6y ago
      While I agree with your statement, please do not insinuate or ask if the commenter has read the article. It is against the rules. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
      • viklove 6y ago
        HN has such odd and draconian rules that should really come under scrutiny more often. We're not allowed to think or say certain things? What?
        • easton 6y ago
          It's why the discourse stays on point and doesn't devolve into flame wars, or that's the theory, anyway. Pretty much everything has been designed to make people stay friendly.
          • viklove 6y ago
            Very Brave New World-esque. Make rules to keep everyone friendly, but meanwhile what you're actually doing is silencing people and making it impossible to have any real discussion. I better be careful, since I'm only allowed to make 4 comments an hour I have to be very selective of the opinions I share.
        • jhawk28 6y ago
          Asking if the user has read the article is an ad-hominem attack. The guidelines are there to encourage good discussion.
        • dang 6y ago
          I wish they would come under scrutiny more often—it would mean people are reading them! Everything on https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html is derived from (a) HN's core value of intellectual curiosity, which is the sole thing we're optimizing for (https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=curiosity%20optimiz%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&sor...), and (b) well over 10 years of experience operating this place. Not only that, but they're garbage-collected periodically, meaning that if there's any rule there which isn't 'paying' for the space it consumes on that page, we take it out. It's like a codebase that way: complexity is the enemy, less is more, and deleting is at least as important as adding. If anyone has a cogent case for deleting one of the guidelines, that would be most helpful. If anyone can think of one that should be added, and can't be derived from what's already there, that would also be helpful.
• 0-_-0 6y ago
  For anyone who wants to set their Bayesian priors to estimate the probability of a lab leak I recommend this list: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accidents_and_incidents_involving_laboratory_biosecurity https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_accidents_and_incident... For example, the SARS coronavirus (SARS-CoV-1) escaped from the lab twice, both in 2003 and 2004.
  • offby37years 6y ago
    And https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wuhan_Institute_of_Virology https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wuhan_Institute_of_Virology is one of only two BSL–4 labs in China.
    • robin21 6y ago
      > BSL-4 level lab put into operation in January 2018 And only 2 years later we have an outbreak
  • AdamJacobMuller 6y ago
    Lab 257 is an amazing book about germ research labs. It fascinated me both with how hard it is to contain diseases under ideal conditions (lab 257 was on an island miles from anything inhabited) and how poor of a job people who should have known better, the actual virologists and people with MDs, did at containing diseases they were researching. https://www.amazon.com/Lab-257-Disturbing-Governments-Laboratory/dp/0060011416 https://www.amazon.com/Lab-257-Disturbing-Governments-Labora... Warning: this book is non-fiction and is scary.
    • ceejayoz 6y ago
      > Warning: this book is non-fiction and is scary. It may be scary, but it's not non-fiction. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_257#Discredited_conspiracy_theories https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_257#Discredited_consp... > A discredited 2004 book entitled Lab 257: The Disturbing Story of the Government's Secret Plum Island Germ Laboratory fueled the conspiracy theories. Archived specimens show that Lyme disease was endemic well before the establishment of Plum Island laboratory. Additionally, Lyme disease was never a topic of research at Plum Island, according to the US Department of Homeland Security and Department of Agriculture.
• fulion 6y ago
  In fact, it is very likely that the virus was brought to China by American soldiers during the military Games held in Wuhan, because there have been patients with similar pneumonia in the United States for a long time, but it has not been taken seriously. It just happened that the Spring Festival travel rush in China led to the widespread outbreak of the virus and was widely paid attention to
  • benlumen 6y ago
    Are you joking? > Account created 2 minutes ago Interesting.
    • someperson 6y ago
      The "virus brought in by foreign soldiers during 2019 Military World Games" is a widely used narrative in government of China propaganda. It's understandable that many people believe it. It's not just paid trolls ("wumao") who believe this, but even normal people are susceptible to spreading such falsehoods.
      • benlumen 6y ago
        That's a brand new account pushing that narrative. They're here.
    • fulion 6y ago
      In the United States, many variants of the new coronavirus have been detected, and the types of these viruses are more complex than those found in China.
    • dang 6y ago
      "Don't feed egregious comments by replying; flag them instead." a.k.a. Please don't feed the you know what. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
  • fulion 6y ago
    Long before the virus was discovered in China, many people died in the United States because of the mysterious e-cigarette. Now it seems that these people are probably suffering from the new crown virus, but no one noticed it at that time.
• benlumen 6y ago
  Related - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26389690 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26389690 (In 2018, US Diplomats Warned of Risky Coronavirus Experiments in a Wuhan Lab - politico.com)
  • neonate 6y ago
    Also - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25640323 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=25640323 (The Lab Leak Hypothesis - nymag.com)
  • Pyramus 6y ago
    Please check the actual cables before jumping to conclusions https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26447042 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26447042
    • neartheplain 6y ago
      “If you actually read the cables [...]” Link?
  • EMM_386 6y ago
    MIT Technology Review, last week: "Did the coronavirus leak from a lab? These scientists say we shouldn’t rule it out." https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/03/18/1021030/coronavirus-leak-wuhan-lab-scientists-conspiracy/ https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/03/18/1021030/coronavi...
• Simulacra 6y ago
  I think it's possible the virus leaked from a lab in China, but it's also possible it was transmitted in the wild a la "wet markets". Either way, regrettably due to Chinese propaganda and tight controls on speech and the press, it is highly unlikely the world will get an open and honest investigation from the Chinese government. The PRC simply cannot be trusted, which sadly has added immense fuel to all conspiracy theories involving that nation. I think the Wuhan/COVID/Coronavirus can be compared to the Soviet government's response to Chernobyl. Great efforts were made to keep a lid on that disaster from the people, and the world, until it was too great to ignore. Granted, a long time ago, but it's an example of what a totalitarian government (like China) might do in the face of such catastrophe.
  • AnimalMuppet 6y ago
    My own idea is a combination of the two. I wonder if it leaked out of the lab by a lab employee trying to make some money on the side by selling lab animals to the wet market. (Note well: This is just my "seems kind of plausible" guess. I have no actual evidence to support it. And no, it's not actually "my own" idea - I heard it suggested by someone, who also had no evidence that I recall.)
    • PicassoCTs 6y ago
      半混蛋 So you say, it was the janitor, with dead lab animals, in the wet market, making some surplus money? I assumed it was the gardener, in the dining room, with the hatchet.. Its almost as if the whole human species could not be trusted with dangerous tools and regularly drops the ball. These wet-market are such a medieval relic and all just because of superstitious nonsense about refrigerated food being bad for your chi. Homeopathy, TMC and how those shamanistic practices are all called wherever by whomever kill. 2.7 million so far... Even worser, when you think about all those other "tech" miracles enlightenment zealots insist humanity can be entrusted. We blow a nuclear power plant every ten years, drop the vials like they are hot, but hey more power into each pocket. Cant wait for the first long-range flying car, getting hacked and used in a remote attack. That surely will be the day, someone will admit that tech is limited,not by what can be done, but by who gets to wield it. Makes one wonder though, that day i entrusted that vital system for millions, to that upstream repo.. was i the janitor that day..
• daly 6y ago
  For expert opinion on this subject listen to actual virologists. They do a podcast about 2-3 times a week. https://www.microbe.tv/twiv/ https://www.microbe.tv/twiv/
  • ciupicri 6y ago
    So I should listen to all podcasts?
    • wolfram74 6y ago
      Podcasts run on a given domain run by domain experts are certainly a good step above, epistemologically speaking, than a lot of news source on said domain. Obviously you can't be 100% sure any statement about the physical world is true, so you know, believe what you want.
  • TearsInTheRain 6y ago
    Their main argument in the podcast is that the scientist in the lab says that they were not working on this virus and "even with the central control of china there is no way they could keep that secret". That argument is not going to hold a lot of water with people
    • is-ought 6y ago
      Eh, 'trust the experts' works in most other cases.
    • coliveira 6y ago
      > That argument is not going to hold a lot of water with people Yeah, because people prefer to hold their pet conspiracy theories.
    • ekianjo 6y ago
      > "even with the central control of china there is no way they could keep that secret" Funny, we have thousands of people in certain countries in three letters organizations who can keep secrets just fine.
• kangnkodos 6y ago
  This reminds me of the conspiracy theory book, Lab 257. There was a lab on Plum Island in the Long Island Sound that studied infectious diseases. If you trace back the spread of Lyme disease in time, you get two points. One in Connecticut, and one on Long Island, where workers got on the boats to Plum Island. The lab was studying diseases similar to Lyme disease at the time. All those are facts. The conspiracy theory is that Lyme disease was accidentally released by that lab. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_257#Discredited_conspiracy_theories https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Building_257#Discredited_consp...
  • ceejayoz 6y ago
    > Archived specimens show that Lyme disease was endemic well before the establishment of Plum Island laboratory. > Additionally, Lyme disease was never a topic of research at Plum Island, according to the US Department of Homeland Security and Department of Agriculture. These are facts, too, in your link. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
    • AdamJacobMuller 6y ago
      You should read the actual book, because it addresses both of these points.
      • ceejayoz 6y ago
        How? https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyme_disease#History https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lyme_disease#History > The 2010 autopsy of Ötzi the Iceman, a 5,300-year-old mummy, revealed the presence of the DNA sequence of Borrelia burgdorferi making him the earliest known human with Lyme disease. Unless it's got conclusive evidence of a functional time machine, it's gonna struggle to explain how a town in Connecticut predates a prehistoric mummy.
• crx07 6y ago
  This has honestly been my unbiased opinion since essentially day 1. I believe that the release was almost certainly a complete accident, but there's just no realistic chance a novel virus coincidentally originates in the same isolated place as a lab that specializes in that exact same type of virus. The denialists, including the WHO and CDC and everyone else, need to get real and own up to what happened and figure out how to stop it from happening again. This has nothing to do with the PRC or anyone or anywhere else, it could have happened at any biological facility in the world and will eventually happen again somewhere unless scientific honesty and cooler heads prevail.
  • Ancapistani 6y ago
    > there's just no realistic chance a novel virus coincidentally originates in the same isolated place as a lab that specializes in that exact same type of virus. I think that it is at least somewhat likely that it was the result of the lab's activities, but your assertion here has a huge dose of selection bias. If the virology labs studying coronaviruses were placed randomly around the world, you'd be correct - but they're not. They're placed near locations where novel coronaviruses have crossed the species barrier in the past, and where they are likely to do so in the future. It would be equivalent to say that lighthouses cause ships to run aground, because many teams when ships run aground it's near a lighthouse.
    • SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
      > They're placed near locations where novel coronaviruses have crossed the species barrier in the past, and where they are likely to do so in the future. Are they? I'm not aware of this trend, or of any other major species barrier crossings in Hubei. (If you're thinking of the original SARS, that started in Guangdong, two provinces to the south.)
    • is-ought 6y ago
      Can you link to something that proves this is the criteria used for lab placement?
    • deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
• traveler01 6y ago
  It's very possible and shouldn't be dismissed at all. But we will never know since the CCP has already covered its tracks (not saying it was on purpose, but a clearly an accident covered by the CCP).
  • jtdev 6y ago
    It seems that the CCP actually very deliberately covered tracks here... nothing accidental about it.
• SlipperySlope 6y ago
  The trend of circumstantial evidence continues to favor the lab leak hypothesis. In contrast there is no new circumstantial evidence favoring the natural origin hypothesis. Reported last year... US investigating 'hazardous event' in Wuhan lab in October Alleged 'hazardous event' occurred days before Wuhan Military World Games in October Plus, genetic drift research shows virus first cases in October.
• beervirus 6y ago
  Anybody who thinks it should be dismissed has an unwarranted amount of faith in the CCP.
• mancerayder 6y ago
  How soon before stuff like this is marked as misinformation if it isn't coming from established media outlets? You know, dangerous conspiracy theories, and all that. Real world consequences, etc. and so forth.
  • wallawe 6y ago
    Are you saying an opinion piece stating that we should leave open the possibility of a leak is misinformation? That doesn't make any sense.
    • hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
      Not OP, but I'm assuming he was arguing that, given that the major social media platforms have said they will remove any Covid information that is misleading, would they even allow posts like this "suggesting the possibility of a Wuhan lab leak is plausible". Note Facebook has previously explicitly banned posts "falsely claiming the virus is man-made". Source: https://www.npr.org/2021/02/08/965390755/facebook-widens-ban-on-covid-19-vaccine-misinformation-in-push-to-boost-confiden https://www.npr.org/2021/02/08/965390755/facebook-widens-ban...
      • bosswipe 6y ago
        From FB's policy https://www.facebook.com/help/230764881494641 https://www.facebook.com/help/230764881494641 " Claims that it was created by an individual, government, or country Excluding claims that it was studied in, came from, or leaked from a lab without specifically calling it man-made" So discussing possibility of a lab leak is not a problem, it's the deliberate bioweapon aspect that they're banning. "The goal of this policy is to remove common viral hoaxes that have been repeatedly debunked by independent fact-checkers."
        • ttt0 6y ago
          > So discussing possibility of a lab leak is not a problem, it's the deliberate bioweapon aspect that they're banning. And the virus being man-made is not a possibility? https://www.nature.com/news/engineered-bat-virus-stirs-debate-over-risky-research-1.18787 https://www.nature.com/news/engineered-bat-virus-stirs-debat...
• 0xcafecafe 6y ago
  While the headline talks about covid, I found other bits of the article scary. For instance the supposed lax handling of pathogens like smallpox. While I would trust the worldwide scientific community for covid origin theories, I cannot look past the egregious safety violations reported in the article (if true).
  • loveistheanswer 6y ago
    >While I would trust the worldwide scientific community for covid origin theories Which scientific community are you referring to? There are countless scientists who have been arguing against the risks of gain of function research for many years. Why are pro-gain of function scientists deathly silent now about the supposed benefits of their research?
    • jMyles 6y ago
      I had the same thought. Maybe it's just the crowd I run with, but criticism of gain-of-function research (certainly including informed speculation of a lab escape for this coronavirus) seem very mainstream to me.
      • Pyramus 6y ago
        I believe grand-parent was talking about a lab leak, not necessarily with gain of function research being involved, and scientists dismissal. Which is not a dismissal at all. What scientists are saying is that both zoonotic transfer and lab leak are plausible, but that we don't have evidence for the latter (yet!) and the former is more likely. In many media articles this simplifies to 'scientists say virus origins are zoonotic'.
        • loveistheanswer 6y ago
          >the former is more likely. Is this likelihood differential being calculated using data, or is it just a hypothesis?
• Graffur 6y ago
  Upvoted. People are brainwashed in both directions but discussion shouldn't be banned. EDIT: The downvotes to me represent people who want to silence discussion on the matter.
  • dang 6y ago
    Please don't post unsubstantive and/or flamebait comments, especially on divisive topics. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html Please also don't go on about downvotes. As the site guidelines say, this never does any good and it makes boring reading.
• jtdev 6y ago
  That’s curious. I wonder if the frozen seafood origin hypothesis holds any merit, or if it’s just an attempt by the CCP to divert attention from what seems to be the far more likely lab leak hypothesis... I’m inclined to believe that the CCP is being disingenuous.
  • dang 6y ago
    Please stop posting unsubstantive and/or flamebait comments to HN—especially on divisive topics. The guidelines are clear on this, and we ban accounts that break them repeatedly. Given that we've had to warn you half a dozen times now, it's time for you to review https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and fix this.
    • jtdev 6y ago
      My apologies, I was simply trying to make a sarcastic observation regarding the ridiculousness of one of the CCP's bogus explanations for the virus origin.
    • Graffur 6y ago
      As someone else who has been unfairly flagged on this thread, I will stand up for jtdev. A quick scan of their profile and posts show they have been here 2-3 years. They have a small number of on topic submissions about CEOs, technologies and science. Their posts are normal enough. There's the obvious theme that they're not in the Woke club though.
      • dang 6y ago
        https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26545845 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26545845 was flagged correctly, as I explained there. The issue isn't how long an account has been on HN or the good posts it makes—it's the bad posts. This shouldn't be hard to understand; it's the same principle by which people who always stop at red lights and are nice to supermarket cashiers still don't get to rob banks.
• waynesonfire 6y ago
  This is definitely not my area of expertise but: role of furin cleavage site in covid: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41392-020-0184-0 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41392-020-0184-0 "In fact, no influenza virus with a furin cleavage site has ever been found in nature," https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7435492/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7435492/ Where did this mutation come from?
  • bugzz 6y ago
    It's never been found in an influenza virus in nature, but covid isn't an influenza virus. Is this never found in coronaviruses in nature?
    • tshaddox 6y ago
      From that second link: > Although they only emerge under artificial conditions in influenza viruses, these furin cleavage sites are found within several branches of the coronavirus family tree. However SARS‐CoV‐2 is the only lineage B coronavirus found with one, and the only other coronaviruses known to have them are only at most 60% identical to this novel coronavirus.
      • hn_throwaway_99 6y ago
        I'm not waynesonfire, but seriously, what is up with people making deliberately misleading claims (e.g. highlighting it is not found in influenza viruses, even though covid virus is not influenza), and then providing a link that specifically debunks the implication they are trying to make. It's like people just depend on nobody following the links they post.
        • dang 6y ago
          "Please respond to the strongest plausible interpretation of what someone says, not a weaker one that's easier to criticize. Assume good faith." https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
• duxup 6y ago
  I wouldn't dismiss it. I just haven't seen any evidence of it that I think 'proves' it.
  • roywiggins 6y ago
    Serious coronaviruses have jumped into people like, twice in the last 20 years entirely naturally[0], and so many more people have contact with animals outside of labs than within labs (orders of magnitude!), that it seems much more likely that SARS-CoV-2 jumped the same way than any lab-leak idea. Like, it's physically possible, and it would be important to know if that's what happened- people shouldn't dismiss it!- but I don't know how much it should be entertained as a real likelihood. [0] natural insofar as humans intruding onto wildlife is natural
    • sudosysgen 6y ago
      Serious cornaviruses jumped into people probably dozens of times in the last 20 years, and caused 3 epidemics, not two.
      • roywiggins 6y ago
        I meant to say two times other than Sars-CoV-2 (SARS and MERS).
    • deleted 6y ago
      [deleted]
  • wrnr 6y ago
    The link between the Wuhan lab and the virus is circumstantial, sure it's strange the virus shows up in a city with the only level 4 biolab in China where they research corona viruses, but only if the virus did originate from Wuhan. I don't think we know all the corona viruses in the wild and who was patient zero was.
  • koheripbal 6y ago
    Well it doesn't help that they've blocked the investigation.
• tantalor 6y ago
  Easy answer: it's impossible to prove a negative. In this case, that the lab was not responsible.
  • Delk 6y ago
    You can't prove it, but apparently you can try to find evidence to see if it seems likely: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/03/200317175442.htm https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2020/03/200317175442.h...
    • tantalor 6y ago
      It can be both! The lab could have mishandled a natural specimen, causing first human infection.
  • bootlooped 6y ago
    How do we prove that accused people are not guilty of crimes then?
    • stonogo 6y ago
      In the US courts system, we do not. People are presumed innocent, and the burden of proof is on the prosecution.
      • bootlooped 6y ago
        True. Maybe it was a poor analogy. In a bizarre world where you were presumed guilty, could you do anything? If you submitted evidence that you were on another continent at the time of the crime, doesn't that prove you didn't do it? (Assuming the crime is something you must be physically present to do)
  • tim333 6y ago
    We may find proof of a zoonotic origin away from the lab.
• airhead969 6y ago
  It seems like more Western MSM yellow journalism hating on China with FUD.
  • duxup 6y ago
    Outside of some noteworthy scummy politicians and a few partisan media outlets. I really haven't seen much in the way of MSM media pushing that theory as fact.
    • airhead969 6y ago
      It doesn't matter if they're pushing this far-fetched hypothesis as "fact" or not, they're pushing it by continuously regurgitating such speculative FUD without evidence.
      • duxup 6y ago
        Not everything reported has to be a proven fact. Theories, ideas, there's room for all sorts of things in life that aren't certain.
        • airhead969 6y ago
          Conspiracy theories aren't helpful.
          • duxup 6y ago
            Outside noteworthy scummy politicians and a few partisan media outlets. I really haven't seen much in the way of MSM doing that.
  • dang 6y ago
    Please don't take HN threads into nationalistic flamewar. I've spent a lot of time, energy, and words asking people not to do that in the opposite direction [1]. It applies just as much the other way around. Name-calling, flamebait, and nationalistic provocations take the internet straight to hell. We're trying to avoid that fate here, or at least stave it off [2] a little longer. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26545902 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26545902. [1] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&query=by%3Adang%20chin&sort=byDate&type=story&type=comment https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=true&que... [2] https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&sort=byDate&type=comment&query=stave%20by:dang https://hn.algolia.com/?dateRange=all&page=0&prefix=false&so...
• kneel 6y ago
  IMO it's very likely to have originated in a lab leak. It doesn't matter much however since there is no evidence, and any evidence of such will likely be covered up. Being culpable for a disaster on this scale would be unprecedented in the economic reparations, so much so that we'll likely never find the origins.
  • Johnny555 6y ago
    I think that's how so many conspiracy theories spread. "IMO, I think it's very likely that the moon landings were faked. It doesn't matter since there is no evidence of the fake landings and any evidence of such will likely be covered up, like the way they got scientists to pretend that there are retroreflectors on the moon". As long as people believe that evidence is covered up, then they can believe anything.
    • airhead969 6y ago
      It's easier to believe in a grand conspiracy to make one seem special and part of a tribe than accept the banality, incompetence, chaos, and coincidences of reality.
  • duxup 6y ago
    >Being culpable for a disaster on this scale would be unprecedented in the economic reparations I duno if that would ever really happen. I think much like a lot of things, concerns about Uyghurs it would just dissolve into the diplomatic and economic seas.
  • ekianjo 6y ago
    > Being culpable for a disaster on this scale would be unprecedented in the economic reparations True. And not just economic reparations, you can imagine diplomatic relations and all would be severely impacted.
  • theptip 6y ago
    > it's very likely to have originated in a lab leak What evidence is informing this belief? i.e. what is your model for assigning "P>0.5" to the probability here? For example do you think the SARS outbreak circa 2002 was also a lab escape?
• softwaredoug 6y ago
  New coronavirus pandemics like this aren’t novel. It’s thought many of the boring common cold coronaviruses we don’t think much of started as an outbreak sometime in the past crossing animal-human boundaries One common cold coronavirus that circulates around had a common ancestor in 1890. Suspiciously timed with the Russian “Flu” pandemic of 1890-1891[1] (Not that we can just discount the Wuhan lab theory, but a naturally occurring pandemic like this not that weird historically) 1 - https://theconversation.com/a-brief-history-of-the-coronavirus-family-including-one-pandemic-we-might-have-missed-134556 https://theconversation.com/a-brief-history-of-the-coronavir...
  • loveistheanswer 6y ago
    New coronavirus pandemics like this are novel. Not because it's a coronavirus, but because of how highly adapted and highly transmissible it has been since it was first "discovered". Other such viral outbreaks in recent decades were not nearly as transmissible
• tamaharbor 6y ago
  Like John Lennon sang, “All I want is the truth, just give me some truth”. Very hard to come by these days, especially if it has anything to do with ‘The Orange Man’.
• loveistheanswer 6y ago
  Peter Daszak, member of the WHO Covid origins team, was also the project lead for the US funded gain of function research of novel coronaviruses that was going on at the Wuhan BSL4 lab. There is historical precedent of authorities blaming local meat markets to cover up a lab leak. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sverdlovsk_anthrax_leak https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sverdlovsk_anthrax_leak
  • jtdev 6y ago
    I can't believe that Mr. Daszak is on the origins team... nothing like letting the accused do the investigation.
  • musha68k 6y ago
    Interesting pointer there but his answer on the issue seems plausible as well. Apparently they were "just fishing for funding": https://twitter.com/PeterDaszak/status/1292819714935271424 https://twitter.com/PeterDaszak/status/1292819714935271424 I'm not a virologist but every TWiV episode I listened to, there was convincing talk about natural reservoirs being the most likely source of the virus. AFAIR they also expect similar events to happen increasingly all over the world due to side effects of the climate crisis and global heating.
    • loveistheanswer 6y ago
      >I'm not a virologist but every TWiV episode I listened to, there was convincing talk about natural reservoirs being the most likely source of the virus. In no way whatsoever does that detract from a potential lab leak. The vast majority of viruses used in gain of function research are taken from natural reservoirs.
  • 2-tpg 6y ago
    Peter Daszak was also signatory to this weird paper "in support of Chinese scientists". > We sign this statement in solidarity with all scientists and health professionals in China who continue to save lives and protect global health during the challenge of the COVID-19 outbreak. We are all in this together, with our Chinese counterparts in the forefront, against this new viral threat. The rapid, open, and transparent sharing of data on this outbreak is now being threatened by rumours and misinformation around its origins. We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin. Scientists from multiple countries have published and analysed genomes of the causative agent, severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), and they overwhelmingly conclude that this coronavirus originated in wildlife, as have so many other emerging pathogens. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339367143_Statement_in_support_of_the_scientists_public_health_professionals_and_medical_professionals_of_China_combatting_COVID-19 https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339367143_Statement... Scary piece of propaganda, considering it was China who started rumours and misinformation, and tying the lab leak hypothesis to not supporting health professionals. All-in-all, a grave conflict of interest for a supposed objective investigation into the origins.
• Leary 6y ago
  The virus acquired the traits that made it infectious to humans either through natural selection or bio-engineering. If it was through natural selection, then it was likely such virus was going to cause a pandemic whether it was leaked by the lab or not, since presumably there's a natural reservoir of the virus.
• conspiritards 6y ago
  The absolute state of this thread, it's full of conspiracy theory retards. Sort yourselves out, "hackers".
• tbenst 6y ago
  This article is written by a journalist who is clearly knowledgeable about safety practices and mistakes in US labs, but does not consider the extensive knowledge we have about the sequence of SARS-COV2. The preponderance of evidence supports a natural origin of the virus. This is no way exonerates the Wuhan government from possible culpability—indeed government officials did deliberately suppress information—but this investigative opinion doesn’t pass scientific muster. Misinformation. https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0820-9 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0820-9
  • garmaine 6y ago
    I think you are confusing “lab leak” with “lab manufactured.”
    • karmasimida 6y ago
      Why would it be more feasible this virus is leaked from the lab other than some wild animals from the market itself? Either can be equally believable yet impossible to prove.
      • garmaine 6y ago
        There are cases in Wuhan which predate the wet market cluster. That appears to have been a super spreading event but not the origin. The bats this disease come from we’re not being sold in the market at this time. They’re out of season. So already the theory is assuming a multi-animal hop (some other wild animal got in contact with a bat and got infected, then captured and moved a thousand kilometers to the wet market and killed). Meanwhile the bio lab in Wuhan received a sample of infectious coronavirus just months prior to the earliest known case. Within a few weeks of the outbreak while China was still downplaying the disease, the central government passed a rushed emergency safety rules update for these labs, starts pushing back on requests for access, and using state media to throw out a bunch of crazy theories about external origin. Anyone with half a brain can connect the dots.
        • 6y ago
• coliveira 6y ago
  Except that experts have visited Wuhan and never found evidence of the theory proposed in this article. I think it is time to stop spreading even more disinformation about this deadly disease. If the US government had taken the virus seriously as the Chinese did, we most certainly wouldn't be in this situation.
  • garmaine 6y ago
    When did experts ever visit the labs in question?
  • koheripbal 6y ago
    China blocked investigators from going to Wuhan Institute of Virology.
    • coliveira 6y ago
      This is a conspiration theory, it doesn't matter how much the investigators do, they'll aways say that China is still hiding something.
  • sasaf5 6y ago
    If the Chinese government had taken this virus seriously from the beginning the world wouldn't be in this situation.
• weibing 6y ago
  "I have heard so many news about a guy winning more than 100 millions from Powerball. I couldn't image that it won't happen to me in the future." That's my translation of this article.
• temp8964 6y ago
  Wow. Why every comment questioned your argument is downvoted or even dead? > is-ought 34 minutes ago [dead] [–] > Can you link to something that proves this is the criteria used for lab placement? How is this even dead? It's only asking for a reference.
  • SpicyLemonZest 6y ago
    This is, unfortunately, one of the issues that's been extraordinarily moralized. I've encountered more than a few people who argue that questions about the lab leak theory are inherently bad faith.
    • enchiridion 6y ago
      Maybe, I'm more inclined to believe it's some classic astroturfing. HN will normally answer questions in good faith, even controversial ones.
  • btilly 6y ago
    Clearly there are a bunch of people voting down anything that is too critical of China. WHY there are a bunch of people voting that down I leave to others to speculate. But I'm going to vote up any verifiable factual statements that have been voted down.
    • Fricken 6y ago
      There are no pertinent facts anywhere in this thread. There are no pertinent facts available. We just don't know, and likely won't ever know.
      • louloulou 6y ago
        And we should ask that is. The fact that investigations to find patient 0, either never happened or were covered up is strong evidence for the WIV leak theory.
    • dang 6y ago
• pnathan 6y ago
  I have three perspectives here I want to share. (1) Let's address the glass windows in our own house first and tighten the US policies and culture. Secrecy is not a good idea here. Without even reflecting on Covid, it is clear the author has been dealing with this a while, and the US needs to improve. I am reminded of discussions on the old '50s/'60s nuclear culture... (2) A year later, it may not be possible for the most honest, the most painstaking, the most independent reconstruction of the Wuhan lab events to properly track what occurred. Nor would it be per se politically doable. It might, however, be feasible for the Chinese official position to commit to an enhanced tightening of policies and culture around lab handling of specimens, in light of current events and looking forward. (3) To a first approximation (the same one where Pi = 3), I don't care if Covid comes from a lab, a bat, a pig, or a chicken. I care that there are dead people, and that there was massive dysfunction globally & in a multipartisan way in the response, leading to more dead and disabled people...
  • pageandrew 6y ago
    1. The virus did not originate in our own house. Seems like a deflection to say we should focus on ourselves when we're starting at evidence that Chinese missteps could have caused a global pandemic that has killed millions and upended life for billions. 2. Doesn't mean we shouldn't try. We should also acknowledge that an investigation much earlier on could have happened if it were not for Chinese government obstructionism and cover-ups. 3. Why do you not care about where it came from? The allegation at hand is that China's irresponsible scientific experimentation "created" this virus (intentional oversimplification) and allowed it to leak. If the truth never comes out, and China is never held accountable, the same thing could happen again. Why is your sole interest the global response to the pandemic as opposed to the missteps that caused the pandemic in the first place?
    • carols10cents 6y ago
      1. Even if this particular virus didn't originate in our own house, if we want to demand openness and security from other countries, we in the US should start by being open with records of accidents and enhanced measures to prevent future accidents.
• asmint3 6y ago
  That we’re finally seeing some mainstream discussion around this hypothesis should not change the scary fact that months ago governments, scientists and media happily and immediately rejected it as a xenophobic conspiracy theory. The messaging and subsequent ease at which public opinion was influenced should make everyone pause and think hard about other ways they might be being manipulated.
  • Nav_Panel 6y ago
    It's amazing how much ridicule I took for seriously suggesting this theory last year. My friends twisted and exaggerated the extent of my claims (implying I thought it was an intentional action on China's part, or an engineered virus, and not a result of mundane research + accidental containment failure), and called me a crazy conspiracy theorist. I had been reading every journal article I could get my hands on about the virus since February, but of course how could my interpretation be trustworthy? I'm no expert, or anything. If something I read in a journal article contradicted something on the news, the latter always seemed to "win". After all that, now that the lab thing is on the mainstream news, I'm afraid to even bring it up with my friends. They can figure it out for themselves.
    • brabel 6y ago
      Just in case you didn't understand what the article was saying: "Labs in Wuhan might not have played any role in the origin of the pandemic. But a year later, no source has been found, and the world deserves a thorough, unbiased investigation of all plausible theories that is conducted without fear or favor." It did NOT say the virus was definitely released from a lab. It did NOT present any evidence it was. All the article said was that given the author's experience with labs like this, she thinks the chances the virus escaped are not as remote as the scientists investigating it claim it is. That's all! Your theory might be correct, but as of now, you have no reason to think you've been vindicated. EDIT: author is a woman, so fixed pronoun.
      • jhokanson 6y ago
        Interesting take. I did not interpret their statement as vindication of being correct but rather that this version of events is a possibility that can't currently be dismissed.
• sunstone 6y ago
  The thing that really lends credibility to this theory is that nation states have been suspicious of this from the first few months. These are not ding bat facebook groups but countries that have a fair amount at stake by voicing these concerns and yet they still brought it up. I'm 7/10 that the lab leak theory has legs.
• hayst4ck 6y ago
  https://project-evidence.github.io/ https://project-evidence.github.io/ I found this to be an extremely engaging read and compelling story. TLDR; The likelihood of it being lab related is high. The likelihood of it being directly malicious low. My Take form reading it: The lab in question needed to collect bats for research. A person who collected the bats did so with insufficient safety and is likely patient 0.
  • pageandrew 6y ago
    I agree that the leak was likely accidental. That said, I think you gloss over the fact that Gain of Function Research (artificial selection) was certainly taking place inside the Wuhan Institute of Virology, and that US intelligence has concluded that the WIV was engaging in classified research for the Chinese military, unbeknownst to the rest of the world. So, its not quite as simple as a collection mistake.
    • koheripbal 6y ago
      ...and importantly, there was specifically Coronavirus bat research in that specific facility.
    • hayst4ck 6y ago
      I don't find that compelling. Our own US scientists specifically stated they did not see the biological markers of tampering, and I don't see any reason we shouldn't be trusting them. I think there are a lot of people who want to believe China is evil incarnate and things are just as black and white as that. I think that's a mental shortcut with easy emotional payout. I would encourage you to read the link. Here is a direct link to some gain of function research being done at the lab for anyone interested: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2258702/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2258702/ Relevant line in abstract: > In this study, we investigated the receptor usage of the SL-CoV S by combining a human immunodeficiency virus-based pseudovirus system with cell lines expressing the ACE2 molecules of human, civet, or horseshoe bat.
      • 6y ago
• Huffers2 6y ago
  If true, I think this would be the first ever case of a novel virus ever being developed in a lab and then accidentally released. If false, then it's yet another viral mutation / species cross over which have happened all the time throughout history. When I hear hoofbeats I think "horses" not "zebras"...
  • wccrawford 6y ago
    Why not? There are multiple hurricanes every single year, but I still hear about them. Especially the ones that might affect my area. But it might be more like: "Yet another hurricane cause by weather." Not really a story, since they all have been. The opposite, though, that'd be a real story: "Hurricane not caused by weather!"
    • Huffers2 6y ago
      Sorry, I edited my comment at the same time you posted your comment - leading to yours to not have the proper context. (For the record I wrote something about things that happen frequently not being news)
      • wccrawford 6y ago
        No worries!
  • georgeglue1 6y ago
    It's obviously super hazy, but it's worth clarifying that being developed in the lab != originating from the lab. From what I've heard on Chinese social media, there are a bunch of plausible sounding theories. For a lot of jobs in China, it's expected that there's moderate incompetence or grift. For example, say the lab has a bunch of extra animal samples (mice, bats, w/e). Someone in the cleaning staff could make a few extra $ by selling those samples to a wholesaler at the local wetmarket (to be turned into dogfood, etc.); maybe they only meant to sell the clean samples, but got things mixed up.
  • whiddershins 6y ago
• woodruffw 6y ago
  My understanding of the author's central thesis is this: the US, despite its world-class virology and disease study labs, regularly has lapses in procedure that regularly lead to situations in which the public might be exposed. Given that this is happening in our own backyard, we might reasonably expect countries of similar status (like China) to experience similar lapses. That reads as reasonable to me, but raises a subsequent question: if these lapses are so common and so many countries possess the capacity for serious mistakes, why don't we see more regular outbreaks (if not full-blown pandemics) caused by labs? In other words, what makes COVID special? I didn't find a satisfactory answer to the latter question in the article. It's my (uninformed, uneducated) opinion that the severity of the author's claims don't correspond to the reality of the last few national and international disease crises (AIDS, Ebola, Zika, COVID). Which isn't to say that we should absolutely dismiss the possibility that COVID originated in a lab, only that claims that it did amount to currently unsubstantiated claims about COVID's special status among other recent pandemics.
  • medymed 6y ago
    Other viruses do escape the lab sometimes. The first SARS virus escaped the lab more than once. https://genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/gb-spotlight-20040427-03 https://genomebiology.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/gb-...
    • Enginerrrd 6y ago
      Both in China no less.
    • woodruffw 6y ago
      I'm not claiming that they don't! The article has multiple examples of viruses escaping either individual containment or the lab outright. What I'm claiming is that the volume of attributed escapes indicates that the average escape has relatively local consequences. In other words: historically, when everything goes wrong, it hasn't resulted in a global pandemic. What, then, made or makes COVID special? Maybe the answer is raw numbers, and that it was bound to happen eventually. But "one of these incidents was bound to cause a global pandemic" is the exact same reasoning as the (original, still mainstream?) "wet market" theory. What I'd personally like to know is why I should believe one over the other, apart from human propensity to believe conspiratorial claims.
• tehjoker 6y ago
  Pretty incredible how far the US media will go to deflect attention from how bad the US response to the pandemic was to China. "Let me be clear: Labs in Wuhan might not have played any role in the origin of the pandemic. But a year later, no source has been found, and the world deserves a thorough, unbiased investigation of all plausible theories that is conducted without fear or favor." Okay. So basically this author has no evidence other than the fact that it's very difficult, maybe impossible to identify the site of first transmission. I don't know what progress would look like, but maybe sampling animals in the wild to find a carrier with a genetic signature that looks like an early version? This is just speculative nonsense to try to hype the government's pivot to China. That's why its in the opinion section, the worst part of the newspaper.
  • varjag 6y ago
    No, the evidence is there's a relevant viral research lab in the epicentre with known history of safety issues and no animal transmission link have been confirmed.
    • tehjoker 6y ago
      There's evidence that many things are possible. Conspiracies are possible, but they are primarily a diagnosis of exclusion OR if there is specific evidence pointing in that direction. The US media has made an art out of turning speculation into exciting narratives that large fractions of the population believe that turned out to be completely fabricated but retain adherents for years or generations after.
      • varjag 6y ago
        It's not a conspiracy, but a not improbable covered up accident. I.e. something pretty normal in any authoritarian state. I don't think anyone suggests the CCP unleashed the virus onto its own city on purpose.
        • tehjoker 6y ago
          You're alleging the CCP is covering up their role a global pandemic. That's a conspiracy as there is a group of powerful people hiding something from the public. I believe in many conspiracy theories that have substantive evidence for them (e.g. the Gulf of Tonkin Resolution was faked), so I don't dismiss the idea of a conspiracy as impossible, they happen every day. However, there is no substantive evidence presented here other than the mere possibility that someone might have done something bad.
• trynton 6y ago
  Without any verifiable evident, it just doesn't make sense. There is a continual exchange of information between Wuhan and other centers of disease control. So it would be very difficult to keep such a secret. Besides, if it was a virus that escaped, then the Chinese would already have the means to create a vaccine and so save the planet. Instead they did nothing and sat on it.
  • Spooks 6y ago
    >have the means to create a vaccine and so save the planet is that true though? Aren't a lot of diseases being worked on in labs without the means to cure them yet
• whytaka 6y ago
  Regardless of its origin, what I cannot possibly figure out is why China didn't close its own borders while they were putting travel restrictions within.
  • JulianRaphael 6y ago
    Think of it from a perspective of game theory and geopolitics. You have an epidemic raging in your country that has led to lockdowns, casualties and severe economic damage. Now you have two options: 1. Warn the world, lock your borders down, suffer economic damage whilst the rest of the world will prevent your citizens from entering their countries and can prepare for a proper response. Experience a setback on the stage of geopolitics and a loss of soft power. 2. Don't warn the world, suppress free flow of information, impose internal travel bans to stop the virus from spreading within your country, let your citizens carry the virus to the rest of the world, be the party with asymmetrical information advantage, exploit the situation to further strengthen your position on the global chessboard of geopolitics and expand your soft power. What people in the West tend to forget is that Chinese strategic thinking is older than most Western civilisations. Chinese rulers study Chinese philosophy deeply, whereas Western rulers have little philosophical education. Chinese rulers think fundamentally different from Western rulers and have asymmetrical information advantage in politics as well: hardly anyone in the West really understands Chinese philosophy as it requires you to learn the language to grasp it fully; but it is easy to understand what motivates Western politics. This situation reminds me of one of the Thirty-Six Stratagems. Disturb the water and catch a fish (渾水摸魚／混水摸魚) Create confusion and exploit it to further one's own goals.
  • koheripbal 6y ago
    Because that would have impacted trade and commerce.
  • alacombe 6y ago
    Because China first reflex is to deny anything is happening. By the time shit hit the fan, it's too late to do anything.
  • DiogenesKynikos 6y ago
• lordgrenville 6y ago
  That's what the people at Rootclaim concluded as well https://www.rootclaim.com/analysis/what-is-the-source-of-covid-19-sars-cov-2 https://www.rootclaim.com/analysis/what-is-the-source-of-cov...
• Giorgi 6y ago
  Looks like breach theory is finally reaching mainstream. Good to know wokies protecting "poor China" will finally GTFO.
  • dang 6y ago
    Please do not use HN for nationalistic or ideological flamewar. We ban such accounts regardless of which country or ideology they are for or against. https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html
• stunt 6y ago
  Virus coming from a lab is just an effort to not invest against the next pandemic. This wasn't the first pandemic, and it isn't going to be the last one.
• jsnk 6y ago
  Mainstream media shouting "discredited", "already debunked!", "fringe", "conspiracy theory", "xenophobic" in unison last time Tom Cotton brought this up was a sign for me that there is actually something to investigate here. - https://archive.vn/TG8zN#selection-999.29-999.84 https://archive.vn/TG8zN#selection-999.29-999.84 - https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/17/business/media/coronavirus-tom-cotton-china.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/17/business/media/coronaviru... - https://www.wired.com/story/coronavirus-conspiracy-theories/ https://www.wired.com/story/coronavirus-conspiracy-theories/ - https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/483354-sen-cotton-repeats-coronavirus-origins-conspiracy-theory https://thehill.com/homenews/senate/483354-sen-cotton-repeat... - https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/02/republican-senator-tom-cotton-regurgitating-coronavirus-conspiracy-theories.html https://slate.com/news-and-politics/2020/02/republican-senat... - https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/18/politics/tom-cotton-coronavirus/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/18/politics/tom-cotton-coronavir... - https://www.huffpost.com/entry/tom-cotton-coronavirus-china_n_5e34a3b7c5b6f26233294378 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/tom-cotton-coronavirus-china_... - https://www.factcheck.org/2020/02/baseless-conspiracy-theories-claim-new-coronavirus-was-bioengineered/ https://www.factcheck.org/2020/02/baseless-conspiracy-theori...
• Invictus0 6y ago
  A friend with access to Merrill Lynch Research told me in August that there was strong consensus around the WIV lab theory. If there's one reliable source of truth in the world, it's the information that banks are betting billions on.
• dwpdwpdwpdwpdwp 6y ago
  So much opinionated certainty. Seems like the only consensus is that the origin was (lab-leak || zoonotic). Given the unlikelihood of ever knowing the true origin story, future epidemic mitigation efforts should just assume both causes. History is rich with examples of both.
• sweis 6y ago
  "WHO Points To Wildlife Farms In Southern China As Likely Source Of Pandemic" https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2021/03/15/977527808/who-points-to-wildlife-farms-in-southwest-china-as-likely-source-of-pandemic https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2021/03/15/9775278... https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/14/health/WHO-covid-daszak-china-virus.html https://www.nytimes.com/2021/02/14/health/WHO-covid-daszak-c... Historically, SARS-CoV-1 is suspected of being transmitted from bats to civets: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3291347/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3291347/ In Feb 2020, China shut down its wildlife farming industry and sent out directions on how to kill and dispose of the animals: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00677-0 https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00677-0 http://www.npc.gov.cn/npc/c30834/202002/c56b129850aa42acb584cf01ebb68ea4.shtml http://www.npc.gov.cn/npc/c30834/202002/c56b129850aa42acb584... https://multimedia.scmp.com/infographics/news/china/article/3064927/wildlife-ban/index.html https://multimedia.scmp.com/infographics/news/china/article/... Wildlife farming was a $70B industry that employed around 2% of China's workforce. There was a short-lived ban in 2003 in response to SARS-CoV-1, which was later rescinded.
• hospadar 6y ago
  Like, so what? Should we care a lot about the safety and security of places where dangerous infectious diseases are studied? sure! I think we should care A LOT MORE about our [apparent total lack of] ability to quickly deploy effective public health responses to new infectious diseases (regardless of their source). Maybe it was an accident at a sloppy lab, ok, so labs on the other side of the planet in sovereign countries we do not control might make mistakes. We should get better at responding fast to save lives. Maybe it was a sinister bio-terrorism plot. We should get better at responding fast to save lives. Bio-terror/warfare plan looks a whole lot like a good public health plan IMO. Maybe gasp it really was from bats or something. We should get better at responding fast to save lives. This stuff DOES happen. Maybe s/.*/I don't care where it came from/g. We should get better at responding fast and saving lives (my opinion).
  • hsitz 6y ago
    Yes, exactly. I would add, though, that the "Wuhan lab leak theory", in many people's minds, seems to be combined with a suspected intentional act by the Chinese government, to unleash a dangerous virus on the rest of the world. I think we should dismiss that part of the theory (it's of course not impossible, just not likely, mostly fun fodder for conspiracy nuts). But as far as infectious disease labs all across the world being dangerous places that need strict safety and security measures, duh, yes.
    • danudey 6y ago
      Let's also add in that the "Wuhan lab leak theory", combined with the "China virus" nomenclature, has resulted in huge increases in racist and white supremacist violence against people of Asian descent.
      • enchiridion 6y ago
        It's infuriating. I'm not sure what the solution is though. We can just not talk about the very real lab leak hypothesis because some people are dangerously unstable.
• alephr 6y ago
  A lot of the discussion I see on this hinges on possibility and not strongly believing the claim is false. Sure, this theory is "possible" in some sense but I rarely see anyone presenting concrete evidence for it and I don't think I've seen anyone who supports it suggest a piece of evidence that would change their mind on it. If most of the discussion on an idea is about how people dismiss it or how any evidence is being covered up the idea might not be that strong.
  • tripletao 6y ago
    I believe it's quite possible (p ~ 0.5) that the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic originated from a lab accident. If the proximal animal host were identified--as it was for both MERS and the original SARS within about a year--then I'd drop that probability by at least a factor of ten. For references see https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26127197 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26127197 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26129052 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26129052
    • alephr 6y ago
      well that's a start, kudos for the probability and evidence that would shift it. Like most people I haven't looked into any of this much before the last year so I'm far from knowledgeable here but: .5 is a surprising number without any additional explanation because it suggests you think this is about as likely as a zoonotic origin (or at least not specifically the result of an accident). Does that probably extend to other viral outbreaks or is it specific to something? My baseline probability would be significantly lower (although non zero because I'm not denying the possibility; the article makes the case that lab safety is a concern worldwide) based on my, admittedly limited, understanding of past outbreaks. Is it the case that you think about as many viral outbreaks were due to lab accidents as not? or maybe this is more specific to coronaviruses or this specific virus? I'm curious how you'd model this, even if informal.
      • tripletao 6y ago
        A few people have attempted such a model: https://www.researchgate.net/publication/345753939_Outlines_of_a_probabilistic_evaluation_of_possible_SARS-CoV-2_origins/link/5fac8f7c45851507810d2fb9/download https://www.researchgate.net/publication/345753939_Outlines_... https://zenodo.org/record/4477081 https://zenodo.org/record/4477081 I don't fully agree with either analysis, but it shows the evidence and basic form of the argument. Most human pandemics historically have originated from natural zoonosis, but the 1977 flu pandemic was very likely a lab accident. So my prior knowing that a pandemic has occurred but nothing else would be small but not zero, perhaps a few percent. That the pandemic occurred in a city that (a) lies far from expected natural spillover regions for SARS-like viruses, and (b) contains the lab with the world's biggest collection of SARS-like viruses increases that probability. That the lab staff say they weren't working with any viruses close to SARS-CoV-2 decreases it, but the obstruction of any attempt to verify that independently increases it back again. The absence of a proximal host also increases that probability. China has every opportunity and motivation to find that, and so far they've failed. I guess it's possible that they found it and they're lying, because they seem determined now to show that the virus originated outside China; but the lab leak has become a sufficiently established part of (politicized and largely science-free) anti-China rhetoric that I'd guess they'd welcome the chance to prove it false. Of course that could just mean the pandemic originated from a very rare but natural event. But that then raises the possibility of a naturally-evolved virus released by WIV staff, whether by way of the lab or just from a researcher who gets infected on a sampling trip--WIV collection activity is a small fraction of total human activity in spillover areas, but a large fraction of human activity travelling from the most remote virus-rich regions back to Wuhan. If you're interested in this, I'd suggest Alina Chan's Twitter feed. She's taken a tremendous reputational risk here, and quite a lot of abuse both from virologists who find it unthinkable that their work could lead to such a catastrophe, and from genuine conspiracy theorists disappointed when what they thought was their ally debunks their science-free claims.
• cblconfederate 6y ago
  It will be interesting if the cause of the pandemic can be pinned down to specific time, place and person
• 6_3_1 6y ago
  the elephant in the room that became too controversial to question. Solid post
• the_jeremy 6y ago
  As a layperson whose activism only amounts to charitable donations, yard signs, and voting, why should I care whether this virus was a lab escapee or naturally spread? This is an earnest question, not a blind "I don't care". I think this is interesting, and I can see some amount of merit in these claims, but at the end of the day it doesn't feel like it matters to me which one it was. It seems like the only change would be "China gets more bad PR" and maybe American racists use this as an excuse to be more racist.
  • 8note 6y ago
    What does this actually change? If China did indeed release the virus, does that mean I should not take a vaccine? That I should stop wearing a mask? If China knows and is hiding it, I'm still not clear what that changes. They'll still know to improve their safety practices
    • stevenhuang 6y ago
      It means culpability. A better understanding of the dangers of experimenting with deadly viruses. All of this contributes to the history and scientific corpus of what not to do, and lessons to learn from in the future that we can point to as what can happen in lab leak scenarios. It's hard to accept in good faith the proposition that not knowing the truth of what happened is preferable to knowing the truth.
  • stevenhuang 6y ago
    History exists for a reason. It's there to learn from. If we can establish that a lab leak lead to a worldwide pandemic, we'd place much more importance on lab security and better handling procedures. If it was naturally spread then we'd look at the feasibility of reducing the chances of this happening again, like improving sanitation of wet markets, implementing regulations, or even banning them entirely. Frankly the notion of it not mattering to someone how covid came to be is absurd. If you don't want something to happen again, you first need to understand the circumstances that lead to it.
• deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
• MisterBastahrd 6y ago
  Here's why I dismiss it anyway: Regardless of what happened inside a lab, or how it got out, it's how we responded to it that ultimately matters. What did we learn from it? How are we prepared to deal with another outbreak in the future? ARE we prepared to deal with another outbreak in the future? If so, how long are we prepared to do so before we let our guards down? The people who are most interested in where it came from instead of how we handled it are those who are politically motivated to disregard safety in general. They need a boogeyman to deflect blame onto for their ridiculous dereliction of duty. I refuse to allow them to do so.
• nathias 6y ago
  maybe we should regulate gain-of-function research not tourism?
• midrus 6y ago
  My conspiracy theory is that, if the virus intentionally or unintentionally escaped from that lab, and the CDC,CIA, whatever, etc already know this, probably everyone prefers to shut up and deny it, because otherwise it might lead to a war with china and it would be a lot worse for everyone.
  • robin21 6y ago
    The only war with China is a trade war and that is only fought by convincing the public to endure the pain. I think everyone would welcome the ability to cut China out of the global supply chain if they could, it’s just about getting the people to go along with it.
  • brippalcharrid 6y ago
    Over the last year there seemed to have been such an outright refusal on the part of relevant sections of the scientific community to countenance the possibility that this virus had leaked from a lab which had been conducting Gain of Function research into bat coronaviruses that I got the impression this must have been motivated by fear that it could lead to political strife, including war, or that it might result in sweeping new restrictions and funding cuts to particular types of research. I think that people can easily develop a misplaced sense of humanitarian responsibility where they are under the impression that they are called to serve a higher purpose and that they feel as though they are beholden to use their power and influence to prioritise (for instance) pacifism and internationalism above the public search for knowledge, where these have the potential to conflict. There can also be a sense in which the scientific establishment pursues its own independent, technocratic public policy. We have seen the huge amount of political power and influence wielded by high-ranking members of the scientific establishment, and no doubt the stakes were raised for this by the fact that it was an election year.
• gregwebs 6y ago
  This is a great article explaining why a lab leak should always be a suspect. The alternative theory is that a virus traveled on its own (via bats or other animals) from bat caves 900km away to Wuhan where there are 2 labs researching bats. One of the labs is lesser known but is right next to the seafood market and the hospital where the outbreak was first known. [1] This article points out that a lab outbreak could have happened in the United States and many places in the world. We need to avoid demonizing China over this if we want to ever find out the truth and learn how to prevent another pandemic outbreak. [1] https://web.archive.org/web/20200214144447/https://www.researchgate.net/publication/339070128_The_possible_origins_of_2019-nCoV_coronavirus https://web.archive.org/web/20200214144447/https://www.resea...
  • kjjjjjjjjjjjjjj 6y ago
    >We need to avoid demonizing China over this if we want to ever find out the truth and learn how to prevent another pandemic outbreak. But China knew about the virus in 2019 and kept it quiet. They silenced scientists. China is complicit in this pandemic and should pay reparations.
    • plibither8 6y ago
      Exactly. Frankly, I'm tired of this tip-toed attitude - there hasn't been any sort of consequences suffered or imposed on the Chinese government for how they surreptitiously dealt with the virus, initially. I'm not condoning or advocating conspiracy theories, but where they are wrong, they should be penalised.
      • throwawaysea 6y ago
        The Chinese government also started limiting domestic flights in January 2020 but allowed foreign flights out until late March 2020 (https://english.alarabiya.net/features/2020/04/09/Coronavirus-Critics-ask-why-China-allowed-flights-out-of-Hubei-during-outbreak https://english.alarabiya.net/features/2020/04/09/Coronaviru...). That seems like they were containing damage that affected them but were happy to risk the rest of the world. I’m not sure if this was an economic decision or something more malicious but it doesn’t matter - how are they not held accountable for this obvious export of the virus? Meanwhile in the US, hysterical partisans attacked Trump for correctly naming the virus along with its origin. This resulted in a societal unwillingness to direct blame at the Chinese government for all their numerous missteps, starting with suppression of early reports of a new pneumonia like illness in late 2019. How many deaths could have been avoided with just the most basic level of transparency and responsibility?
• Uninen 6y ago
  There's a recent episode of Joe Rogan podcast (#1616) with Jamie Metzl that goes quite deep in this very topic: https://open.spotify.com/episode/7aitKgecZ0fPKjT15no5jU?si=hJegiuiFTGO4IH8FYWLSIw https://open.spotify.com/episode/7aitKgecZ0fPKjT15no5jU?si=h... He's also published a blog post titled "Origins of SARS-CoV-2" on his Web site: https://jamiemetzl.com/origins-of-sars-cov-2/ https://jamiemetzl.com/origins-of-sars-cov-2/
• hootbootscoot 6y ago
  Hypothesis. Theories have evidence. This hypothesis has circumstantial evidence that a basic study in RNA molecules, virii, hydrolysis, mutation, protein-mimicry, "trying all keys of a combination lock, getting the right one gives you a direct ticket to an animal cell taking you into it's DNA replication process" The so-called "Spanish Flu" of 1918 had origins in a migratory bird route over large tracts of pig stockyards, and the workers and nearby army base residents were subsequently infected and subsequently brought it over to Europe at the end of WW1. Given both points above, shame on USATODAY for giving the time of day to such dangerous speculation while much of the planet chafes under lockdown and is irritable and hating on China anyway... shameful demagoguery. Dismissed. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RNA_hydrolysis https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RNA_hydrolysis
• StringyBob 6y ago
  The Times newspaper (UK) has also some pretty good investigative coverage with a well-produced podcast episode covering Covid origins - https://play.acast.com/s/storiesofourtimes/failuresofstate-theoriginsofcovid-19-pt3- https://play.acast.com/s/storiesofourtimes/failuresofstate-t...
• EMM_386 6y ago
  Recently from MIT Technology Review ... worth a read: https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/03/18/1021030/coronavirus-leak-wuhan-lab-scientists-conspiracy/ https://www.technologyreview.com/2021/03/18/1021030/coronavi...
• BoorishBears 6y ago
  I think the theory should be dismissed because it's not falseable. Right now, there is no question that say, the US military has samples of Coronavirus. Not for nefarious reasons mind you, but of course it's of military importance to study a global virus if only to work on vaccines and such. Even if Coronavirus originated in nature, going forward if there is ever a new outbreak, you technically can't prove it wasn't the US military accidentally messing up can you? You don't know the characteristics of the strain they're holding, and if it originated in nature then any study of it will show it came from nature. Likewise you can't prove it wasn't the lab. They could have had samples of it from before, how can you prove the negative of that? It's hard to prove you didn't have access to a given thing.
  • BoorishBears 6y ago
    It's weird that this is such an unpopular concept to some people If a child insists you have cooties (the fictitious ones, not lice) do you fight them to the bitter end? You can never prove definitively that you don't since, of course they're not real, and the child gets to define the criteria for having them "oh you can't see cooties with a microscope, only I can!" It's not about implying the Wuhan lab did release the vaccine, but it's about realizing chasing a conclusion that is not falsible is never going to give you a scientific conclusion. - Most of the current lab leak theories revolve around: > But it’s also possible that SARS-CoV-2 evolved naturally in the wild before it was brought into a lab to be studied, only to subsequently escape. At the end of the day you're saying the one thing you can freely observe indicates it was not man-made, but due to factors you can never observe (with an extremely closed country with a government structure that strongly discourages a mistake like this ever being properly attributed even if there wasn't immense pressure to not have this come out as the case) Well when it comes to pinning blame on a country for releasing a virus that leads to a pandemic, "if it quacks like a duck" doesn't pass does it? - Why not spend energy looking at how we went from a virus shutting down a city in mainland China to 500k deaths in the US and all the mistakes made along the way there rather than chasing the equivalent of saying another kid gave us cooties on purpose...
• musicale 6y ago
  I remember reading this article in the WP a year ago which seemed to conflate viral escape with bioengineering and imply that lack of the latter implies lack of the former: "Tom Cotton keeps repeating a coronavirus conspiracy theory that was already debunked" https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/02/16/tom-cotton-coronavirus-conspiracy/ https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2020/02/16/tom-cotto...
  • esja 6y ago
    The mainstream press were all conflating accidental leaks with bioweapons engineering. It went on for months.
• f430 6y ago
  I recall many people calling the Wuhan lab leak theory as conspiracy on HN. They were adamant that it came from bats. Interestingly enough, those accounts were all brand new accounts and some haven't been active on HN for several months all of sudden started coming out of the wood works.
  • deleted 6y ago
    [deleted]
  • La1n 6y ago
    If you want to call people shills, at least gives some evidence.
• musicale 6y ago
  Most of the media coverage and consensus, from the Washington Post to Nature, seems to be that: - the lab escape theory has been thoroughly debunked by science - the WHO investigation put the final nails in the coffin of this theory - therefore, lab escape continues to be a fringe conspiracy theory at best - coverage of the lab escape theory is politically motivated rather than scientifically motivated - continued coverage is largely a combination of irresponsible journalism, disinformation and anti-China political propaganda Does the USA Today article indicate a shift in this perspective, or is it just an outlier? Has something changed, for example new information coming to light?
  • geoduck14 6y ago
    The WHO investigation DID NOT eliminate this theory. From what I remember, while the WHO was investigating, one member said "it didn't come from a lab". Then when everyone returned to their home country, some members suggested that it was possible - and I don't think their official report opined on it coming from a lab.
    • DiogenesKynikos 6y ago
      The official report isn't complete yet, but at the press conference, it was clearly stated that the team as a whole viewed a lab leak as extremely unlikely. More recent statements from team members have elaborated that that was a unanimous judgment of the scientists on the team.
  • Klinky 6y ago
    No, nothing has really changed. It's an opinion article that's basically saying since lab accidents happened elsewhere, a lab accident could have happened in Wuhan. No smoking gun here.
  • hayst4ck 6y ago
    > The lab escape theory has been thoroughly debunked by science This is absolutely not true. Lab invented was debunked, lab escaped was not. Have a read: https://project-evidence.github.io/ https://project-evidence.github.io/
• watertom 6y ago
  A lot of smart people in this forum. Someone please explain to me how the Chinese were able to identify that that had a new virus. I’ve done pandemic drills with homeland security. They said they way you know you’ve got a new virus floating around is either new symptoms; significantly more “flu like” cases; significantly more cases escalating to pneumonia; increased deaths. Covid presents like the flu, so much so you need a test, but early on a test was not available. So the symptoms are not unique. Early on there was not a spike in cases, so that would not have sparked an interest. Early on there was not a significant uptick in flu cases turning to to pneumonia, so that would not have sparked interest. Early on there was not a spike in deaths, so that would not have e sparked an interest. In fact when the Chinese discovered covid, there was absolutely no evidence that anything out of the ordinary was taking place. But somehow the Chinese knew that they had a very contagious, bat based virus circulating, based on no information. Everyone is focused on the wrong thing, I want to know how they discovered it with no information? I’ve always believed this was an lab accident by a technician that needed their job so they covered it up until they and too many family members got sick and it was obvious something was wrong. They knew about the virus because it was being studied, and that’s the only answer that makes any sense.
  • dillondoyle 6y ago
    So many great replies answer/correct some of these assumptions. Want to add that I highly recommend the frontline doc it has so much great reporting that gives the background needed here. https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/chinas-covid-secrets/ https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/frontline/film/chinas-covid-secrets...
  • miemo23 6y ago
    but there was a spike in pneumonia related cases... didn't a doctor sound the alarm on this (and was reprimanded for it)
    • esja 6y ago
      Several doctors were discussing it in a WeChat group in December 2019 and were basically arrested and forced to apologise for spreading “misinformation”. The main person who became famous for sounding the alarm (Li Wenjiang, an ophthalmologist) later died of the disease.
• Graffur 6y ago
  Science, like journalism, is supposed to be about facts and about getting to the truth. No source of covid-19 has been found. Similar lab leaks happen frequently. BUT.. you're not allowed to discuss it with the undertones that you're a bad person. If you say china virus you could be accused of being a racist. But if you say South African or British variant it's okay. The mental acrobats are insane. If you suggest people aren't thinking critically about it you will be accused of flamebaiting or trolling. If you call out people who are trying to silence your comments you'll be accused of "making boring reading". I think it should be discussed, debated and seriously considered. There is a suggestion in here to assume both the animal farm and the lab were the cause and to respond appropriately. With lack of further evidence I think this is the best idea.
  • albatruss 6y ago
    There is no blame or antagonism towards British or South Africans implied by the use of those terms. No British or South African communities have seen a rise in violence against them in the last year. It's not mental acrobatics. It's pragmatism and empathy.
    • shard972 6y ago
      https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2021-01-19-dont-call-it-the-sa-variant-scientists-and-researchers-plead/ https://www.timeslive.co.za/news/south-africa/2021-01-19-don...
  • ckardat123 6y ago
    I would think that the reason that people calling COVID the "China virus" are accused of racism is that there is really no reason to use that term for the virus outside of trying to offend others.
    • snicksnak 6y ago
      Can we call it the chinese variant then? Because we do that with the new mutations: the brazilian variant, british variant, south african variant
• xrd 6y ago
  If there are "so many dangerous terrorists" worthy of trillions of dollars of military spending to protect me (I'm in the US, but all governments invoke terrorism as justification), why aren't those terrorists utilizing viral weapons like this person describes? Is there something that could stop this kind of threat, if it is as real as described?
  • cdolan 6y ago
    Playing devils advocate here but… people are so scared of everyone we literally do not go outside anymore. Is that not successful terrorism?
• kevbin 6y ago
  > We need to avoid demonizing China over this if we want to ever find out the truth and learn how to prevent another pandemic outbreak. No, we need to shame China and the Chinese people until they respect basic human dignity. Until they do, the country and its people are a dangerous, malignant threat to our civilized, Western world.
  • justinpowers 6y ago
    A government and its people are not equivalent. The people should not be shamed in the same manner that you would shame a government. More importantly, with your last sentence you’re implying that China and the entire eastern world is not civilized. Shame on you.
    • kevbin 6y ago
      You’re right, the government and its people are not equivalent.
  • dang 6y ago
    Comments like this are completely unacceptable on Hacker News and we ban accounts that post this way. I've addressed this here: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26548697 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26548697. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26547861 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=26547861.
• deleted 6y ago
  [deleted]
• fredgrott 6y ago
  People are injecting politics into this instead of medical science and science of human behavior. China got caught with their pants down on pandemic prevention given their past research into bat virus and their own initial warning in 20127. That does not mean that combine that with politics about the CCP to jump to a lab accident conclusion. Even the US Defense Intelligence structure has jumped to such a conclusion.
• docmars 6y ago
  Huh, I remember a certain "conspiracy group" that was demonized and declared a terrorist organization trying to think more deeply about a theory like this. Now a mainstream media outlet publishes this and nobody bats an eye. Pun intended. ;) The hypocrisy is strong with this one, Luke.
• cletus 6y ago
  I see three broad dimensions to any lab origin theory: 1. It was human made or found. Human made is common QAnon fodder. I don't believe anyone serious finds that idea credible. Nature is probably far better at concocting new viruses than humans are. And if it was found, where did it come from? I'm honestly surprised DNA sequencing hasn't been more effective in answering this question thus far; 2. Whether it was deliberately released or accidentally leaked. Note that a deliberate release doesn't have to be state-sponsored. It could be a rogue employee like the Anthrax letters from ~20 years ago; and 3. Whether the lab knew what they had or they didn't. Coronaviruses are studied by Chinese labs. They could have hundreds of samples without realizing that one in particular can infect humans and be transmissible effectively and asymptomatically. I suspect that in any version of the lab origin theory that it's more likely they didn't know what they had. That would take human testing. What does seem clear is that the CCP isn't particularly interested in getting to the bottom of this. I wouldn't take that as evidence of them having more knowledge of this than we do. I suspect they simply don't want to know. More to the point, I think the CCP sees efforts to find out as a direct attack on China.
• masswerk 6y ago
  Shouldn't we see rather distinct spread patterns for the two scenarios (a lab accident and contaminated frozen food at the market)? I guess, the patterns, social contacts, habits and locations of a typical lab worker or scientist is quite distinct from those of a typical person working at the market, even in the CPR. (In the first case, the market may be expected to be just another case in a wider spread pattern with a gravitational center involving typical contacts and residential areas of lab workers, in the second one, we may expect to observe an initial spread around the market and the living quarters of those, who work there.) Even without a patient zero, there should be some indications regarding clusters in early observations.
• fireeyed 6y ago
  Didn’t YouTube and Twitter start banning people for evening broaching this topic.
• williesleg 6y ago
  Easy to find the chinese bots here.
• jfoster 6y ago
  1. Start with the 3 earliest known cases. 2. Review CCTV of their movements for the 14 days prior. 3. Find the commonality. If there's genuine interest in where it came from, I think the answer is certainly findable.
• endisneigh 6y ago
  Assuming it was leaked and China didn’t disclose it - so what? Is the idea to blame China for everything? What’s the play? I honestly don’t see what difference it makes from it coming from a lab in China vs someone eating something they weren’t supposed to be vs a bat, etc. I’m honestly curious to why it matters - not to say that we shouldn’t pursue the truth but it seems like it doesn’t matter. These theories without conclusive evidence seems to just blame China - which unfortunately drive anti Sino sentiment.
• disgruntled101 6y ago
  It seems that the common trend of explaining why China covered up the information and didn't let external third parties investigate is due to possible backlash. My simple question is, why fear backlash if it wasn't a leak either due to incompetence and malice? If bats from outside the lab truly started it, why not let observers see this? Why hide it?
  • rossdavidh 6y ago
    It is not impossible that the authorities in China don't actually know what happened, but are afraid that it could have been a lab accident. Thus, they cover up from observers just in case, even though it might not actually have been the source. But, I share your concern.
• smohare 6y ago
  In this thrwad
• tedk-42 6y ago
  All these speculation pieces and theories without any proof at all. My issue with the theory is it lights a fuel under people for more racism against asians in general. Until there's solid evidence, everyone should dismiss it as just that - a theory.
  • moosey 6y ago
    Right. If everyone wants a scapegoat there is a real one that we can all focus on: meat consumption. 1918 flu pandemic probably started on a pig farm. This one at a wet market. We encroach on nature to make more corn and soy for meat, the outcome will be more diseases and death, and that doesn't even include the health issues and dangerous conditions required for cheap meat. This isn't a theory, unfortunately, but since it requires self reflection it will never be a popular story in the US media. I admit I have seen it discussed in print several times.
• marshmallow_12 6y ago
  WARNING: shameless conspiracy theory ahead: Let me explain that i'm not trying to push any agenda, or that i ever normally believe such things but i think this event hasn't had enough coverage https://thebulletin.org/2019/11/what-happened-after-an-explosion-at-a-russian-disease-research-lab-called-vector/ https://thebulletin.org/2019/11/what-happened-after-an-explo... Conclude what you will. I personally don't know enough so i'm not sure whether a link can be drawn, yet the timing is curious.
• FuckButtons 6y ago
  Utter bollocks. The most galling thing about this is that the more conspiracy theories get spun out the less people are going to hold the global developing world agricultural sector to account and the more likely this is to happen again.
• ngcc_hk 6y ago
  I think accident happened. And it is fierce competition among scientists to get the SAR virus under control. Like things to remember recent case of a doctor bought some cell from mainland to hk for cosmetic operation, it just happened and if unchecked will happen again. Whether it is deliberated it is harder. But if it is an accident. And let Wu Han people to fly away to the world ...
• EGreg 6y ago
  Isn't there a site where you can bet and win if you can show the opposite, that it's originated outside the lab? What is the name...
• shadowbanned69 6y ago
  So many white supremacists here! China innocent. China do no wrong. China loves you long time.
• andagainagain 6y ago
  Step 1 - provide evidence.
• ngloom 6y ago
  Then why the USAMRIID lab leak theory should be dismissed ?
• dionian 6y ago
  China is pushing real hard to discount it and try to hype up zoonotic transmission. That should tell you something.
  • dragonwriter 6y ago
    > China is pushing real hard to discount it and try to hype up zoonotic transmission. That should tell you something. That's what China would be expected to do: (1) if it knew the Wuhan lab leak theory was correct, (2) if it knew zoonotic transmission was correct. (3) if it had no idea what was going on. (4) if it wasn't a lab leak but a deliberate biological weapons test that went wrong, and they has engineered both their overt argument and the lab leaks story as layers of cover. So, no, their behavior here tells us nothing.
• godmode2019 6y ago
  The cause of this virus while concerning. Is nothing to the hysteria created from this virus, remember how this virus was branded at the start. Basically brave yourself for death, a interesting study is to look at news articles over time. Its an example of bait and switch. This virus is not something that should have gained this much attention. A bayesian inference shows that death when looking at a age stratification chart, who died compared with how many were expected to die in this cohort vs how many where expected to die were it a average flu outbreak in that same population. I was building a model for local hospitals, with information back in march 2020. I grew disheartened when I realised that this killer virus was hardly more deadly than a bad flu year. That brings up the excess deaths, why is it so high? Its hard to find good numbers in this, especially when you apply related increase in violent crime in 2020. Murders increases by 40% in NYC for example. More needs to be done to look into these numbers. The death rate in all countries is died with, nor from. For example the UK lists all deaths who died within 30 days if a positive reading as a covid death. So to get the true numbers you need to apply a bayes model to see what we should have seen in a normal year. A person over 70 has a 10% change if dying each year. So if a virus that had no affect but turned your hair green killed 10% of people in an aged care home this would be branded as a deadly virus. Because of collerlation. Now this virus kills much more than 10%, flu outbreaks have been reported to kill 12-16% of people in aged care homes. Covid is still more however. I am now rambling, I have not squared the circle just yet. I still don't understand the hysteria, but it reminds me of post 9/11. Where people were acting crazy and full of anger. I don't know what comes next, but I can tell you it won't be logical.
  • jmspring 6y ago
    Did your modeling take into account impacts on life due to lingering health issues for those that became seriously ill but did not die?
    • godmode2019 6y ago
      This was not known in march 2020, so no. How can one even quantity that information?
• kiawe_fire 6y ago
  I look forward to seeing this article being retracted and taken offline, banned from being posted on social media, the author fired, and seeing people "cancelled" for sharing this article anywhere. You know... as happened only a few months earlier to people who wrote similar articles and discussed similar theories with very similar hypotheses, but who were NOT writing for a certain publication of a certain leaning. I also look forward to being down voted and told why "it's totally different now".
  • DoctorNick 6y ago
    I look forward to a bunch of HN posters uncritically swallowing State department propaganda.
    • DoctorNick 6y ago
      I have to wonder if the upvoters realize I'm talking about the US State department...
      • FriendlyNormie 6y ago
        Look how low on the page the comment you’re replying to is you zero IQ dipshit. I had to scroll to the bottom and click “more” twice to even find it. The only people digging this deep are the ones who agree with you. We’re intentionally looking for the bottommost comments because we know the best are always downvoted by the NPC fucktards on HN. You obviously agree that HN is overrun by NPCs yet you’re unable to comprehend that the rest of us still exist and behave differently.
• kgeist 6y ago
  I am disappointed there are no Russian hackers in this conspiracy
• christmm 6y ago
  I thought Wuhan lab was calculated to be most likely source by scientists.
• ngcc_hk 6y ago
  You can say German x Spanish flu Uk variant ... you can talk about USA cdc lab issue ... but all is fine with China lab. Who is in charge who is right ...
• z3ncyberpunk 6y ago
  it was never dismissed except by "woke" people
• say_it_as_it_is 6y ago
  Brett Weinstein spoke about this theory several times in the last year. You can hear him discuss it on his Dark Horse podcast relatively often. Here is one episode dedicated to it entirely: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bret-weinstein-and-yuri-deigin-did-covid-19-leak-from-a-lab/id1471581521?i=1000477267706 https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/bret-weinstein-and-yur...
• YaSamPoSebe 6y ago
  You americans are a bunch of nutters. You would believe russiagate, and any slander regarding people your "intelligence agencies" and your "military complex" has decided to label as enemies. Bunch of ignorant criminals whose mentality is formed by the idiotic holywood industry, accusing others of sins of which you are far more guilty than the ones you accuse, starting from the real genocide you perpetrated in the Middle East.
• mikhailfranco 6y ago
  Almost certainly an accidental lab release. Probably from known civilian gain-of-function research. Probably not from a classified military biowarfare program.
• known 6y ago
  Can we seek compensation from China?
• arisAlexis 6y ago
  The problem is that this is a too rational theory. Not enough of a conspiracy (these people prefer to think it was released on purpose to control global population etc). The other end of the spectrum the rationalists and scientists fear that they may go down a slippery conspiracy slope so they dismiss it the first moment another fellow scientist says so. Then the politicians don't want this hot potato in their hands, it could cause global wars economic or otherwise and half the planet resenting the other.
  • FriendlyNormie 6y ago
    The problem is that you’re a huge faggot. You should chop your own dick off, stuff it into your mouth, and sew your lips shut. Dumb fucking cunt.
• choeger 6y ago
  I mean, seriously. How many such labs, specialized in research of Coronavirii, are there in China? It certainly looks like a weird coincidence that the first know hotspot is actually close to such a lab. But of course there are many reports about the virus circulating long before the Wuhan cluster was exposed. Maybe the lab was responsible for that cluster but not the actual first outbreak?
• ourcat 6y ago
  I find it odd that there's no mention at all of the University of North Carolina in any of these articles and threads concerning the handling of deadly pathogens. Before the BLS4 facility in Wuhan was established in 2017, there was a lot of SARS / Coronavirus research going on at UNC (alongside people from Wuhan's Institute of Virology). This included 'gain of function' research which attempts to create the means to 'deliver' pathogens via aerosol. I'm not saying UNC had anything to do with Wuhan itself, but I do notice many articles avoid mentioning that very similar work goes on in other parts of the World. (I was also amazed that the distance from the Wuhan lab to the fish market is startlingly close).
  • tim333 6y ago
    Can't cover everything in one article I guess.
• ggm 6y ago
  Why is nobody discussing confirmation bias? Repetitions of "I knew I was right" are really unhelpful. The fundamentals remain unchanged from when the WHO did their work, nothing said here is adding new evidence, its just the volume of agreement making people feel sure.
• lanevorockz 6y ago
  Theory? Isn't that even an expected result? The virus started in the exact city where one of the top labs in the world. This was either a breach of higienisation protocols or intentional. Of course, claiming it was intentional is a conspiracy theory and likely won't be able to be proven ( even less likely as some doctors were knowingly suicided ). China ended 2019 in a huge crisis and 2020 as the number one world economy. Quite a dramatic change for a year, no?
• cryptica 6y ago
  If globalization and wealth concentration/inequality continues, workers will become more malicious and we're going to be seeing more leaks and unexpected threats coming from all sorts of places and industries. Humanity will destroy itself. It's vital that we decentralize capital and bring back fairness to the global economy.
• scotty79 6y ago
  What evidencewould be sufficuent to disprove this theory? And if no evidence is good enough is it really a theory? How does it fit the detection of the virus in the material collected months before officual discovery in places far away from the place of official discovery?
• mrkramer 6y ago
  I believe US intelligence already knows this was lab leak because one of the Biden's intel guys said it was probably "gain of function" research that led to leak. But I think it was accidental not on purpose because the US would retaliate as fiercely as it was retaliation to Japan for Pearl Harbor. Not the first not the last pandemic that originated in China: https://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/article/140123-spanish-flu-1918-china-origins-pandemic-science-health https://www.nationalgeographic.com/adventure/article/140123-... Some time ago I shared here on HN a US research on "The debate on potential pandemic pathogen creation" https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OaTwPAQ3v0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1OaTwPAQ3v0 Interesting research on bio weaponry.
• magwa101 6y ago
  Closed societies that cannot absorb the truth stop evolving.
• randomopining 6y ago
  If China didn't have any covering up beyond low/middle-level CCP members that wanted to save face... they would be heavily incentivized to allow a thorough investigation. This would let them save face across the world: "Thorough WHO/UN Investigation Shows China Largely Followed Proper Pandemic Procedures" Of course, they don't allow a thorough investigation and thus are trying to hide something.
• g42gregory 6y ago
  I remember that a year ago, such conversations would get a person banned/shadowbanned from Twitter, FB and other media sources. I wonder how many lives were lost unnecessarily because of censorship.
• fukmbas 6y ago
  Sooooo many cult45 on HN. Sad
• mikhailfranco 6y ago
  'A lab leak isn't 100% certain but it seems to be the only logical source of Covid': Washington expert who led inquiry into the cause of the virus reveals three Wuhan lab scientists fell ill in November 2019 https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9410163/US-State-Department-expert-David-Asher-says-lab-leak-logical-explanation-Covid-source.html https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-9410163/US-State-De...