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All I'm saying is that my bias is towards this virus being a natural phenomenon and I think waiting for the full context will settle the case. Jumping to conclu

All I'm saying is that my bias is towards this virus being a natural phenomenon and I think waiting for the full context will settle the case. Jumping to conclusions on the basis of flimsy evidence mainly serves political agendas. We simply will not know for a long time, months or years, where Omicron came from and that's uncomfortable, but we have to sit with that. If you DO want to get conspiratorial, you can watch this 2001 Bush administration pandemic simulation where China blames the US for a smallpox lab leak. It's pretty amusing to me to watch the US administration astounded by their luck of COVID-19 first being identified in China try to flip the script on their simulated exercise. My feeling is this Omicron theory is trying to breathe life back into the original lab leak theory by proxy. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=we7Map5Pho0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=we7Map5Pho0

dls2016 5y ago
I don’t understand how natural origin is your “bias” while everyone else is “jumping to conclusions”. There’s a lack of conclusive evidence for either scenario. And politics aside, SARS has leaked before resulting in deaths… no conspiracy required!
- tehjoker 5y ago
  That's true Delta leaked in Taiwan, but that was a preexisting natural strain. Smallpox's last fatality also was a lab leak. However, most gain of function experiments use test harasses that can't infect humans or can't replicate. It's not impossible, but it's hard to have any conclusion at all at this early date with very little evidence. The virus is infecting so many people and changes so rapidly that a natural explanation will not be surprising in the least. New variants have been expected. I think people are surprised at how bad the new variants have been, but anyone following the scientific literature wouldn't be taken completely off guard.

dls2016 5y ago

I don’t understand how natural origin is your “bias” while everyone else is “jumping to conclusions”. There’s a lack of conclusive evidence for either scenario. And politics aside, SARS has leaked before resulting in deaths… no conspiracy required!

tehjoker 5y ago
That's true Delta leaked in Taiwan, but that was a preexisting natural strain. Smallpox's last fatality also was a lab leak. However, most gain of function experiments use test harasses that can't infect humans or can't replicate. It's not impossible, but it's hard to have any conclusion at all at this early date with very little evidence. The virus is infecting so many people and changes so rapidly that a natural explanation will not be surprising in the least. New variants have been expected. I think people are surprised at how bad the new variants have been, but anyone following the scientific literature wouldn't be taken completely off guard.