4 ms·

The early cases were very heavily concentrated around the Huanan wet market, but not around the lab, which is on the other side of the Wuhan, a pretty massive c

The early cases were very heavily concentrated around the Huanan wet market, but not around the lab, which is on the other side of the Wuhan, a pretty massive city.[0] If the virus had come from the lab, you'd expect the early cases to cluster around the lab. Instead, they were centered around a wet market, just like the early cases of the original SARS were back in 2002. This is completely aside from the other reasons that make a lab leak extremely unlikely. It's public knowledge which viruses the lab in Wuhan works with. The lab regularly publishes its work, lab members go to conferences to present their work, there are international researchers at the institute in Wuhan. There would have been no reason at all for them to hide SARS-CoV-2 prior to the pandemic, and there is simply no shred of evidence that they had SARS-CoV-2. Finally, I would just encourage anyone who's wondering how much stock to put in Ebright's claims to scroll through his Twitter account. The online persona he cultivates is, to put it very politely, that of a troll. 0. https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abp8715 https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abp8715

eternalban 4y ago
As someone else has already pointed out, the provenance of the virus, and its emergence/release location are two distinct matters. There appears to be consensus on the latter: the wet market (although some do wonder about the mystery illness in Summer of 2019, in US). https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/07/11/2-dead-unknown-respiratory-virus-what-could-it-be-14147 https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/07/11/2-dead-unknown-respirat... "A news report from Virginia says that two people are dead and 18 have been hospitalized following an outbreak of an unknown respiratory infection at a retirement community. What could it possibly be?" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Detrick#2019_closure_and_resumption_of_operations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Detrick#2019_closure_and_... So, were these "mystery illnesses" caused by vaccinated US military personnel who work in F.D. cranking around Washington DC metro area?
carrolldunham 4y ago
>If the virus had come from the lab, you'd expect the early cases to cluster around the lab. No, because it's not proposed that the virus leaked out of the lab building into the nearby air. I presume it's more like a person who worked at the lab getting infected, and then moving around the city as normal, needing only to infect one other person, anywhere in the city.
- DiogenesKynikos 4y ago
  And that person just happened to go all the way across the city to a wet market that sells the same sorts of animals that caused the original SARS outbreak in 2002? The earliest known cases are people who worked at the market or lived right next to it. That's exactly what you'd expect for an outbreak caused by animals at the market.
tristor 4y ago
" The closest known CoV RaTG13 strain (96.2%) to SARS-CoV-2 detected in bat anal swabs have been sequenced at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The Wuhan CDC laboratory moved on 2nd December 2019 to a new location near the Huanan market. Such moves can be disruptive for the operations of any laboratory." [0] (page 119) [0] https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/final-joint-report_origins-studies-6-april-201.pdf?sfvrsn=4f5e5196_1&download=true#page119 https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/final-j...
- DiogenesKynikos 4y ago
  The Wuhan Institute of Virology, which studied RaTG13, is not the same thing as the Wuhan CDC. Two points about RaTG13: 1. RaTG13 is not the progenitor of SARS-CoV-2. It's not even the closest known relative any more. A closer relative has since been found in the wild, in bats in Laos. 2. RaTG13 doesn't even exist in live form in the Wuhan Institute of Virology. It only exists there as data on a hard drive, obtained by sequencing traces of RNA in a swab taken from a bat in the wild. A replicating form of the virus has never actually obtained. It's much more difficult to isolate a replicating virus than it is to sequence RNA in a sample. In fact, the WIV has only ever isolated three SARS-like viruses, all of which are publicly known and have been heavily publicized by the WIV (because it's a big deal, scientifically, and reflects well on them).
- alphabettsy 4y ago
  Wasn’t the first case in November though?

eternalban 4y ago

As someone else has already pointed out, the provenance of the virus, and its emergence/release location are two distinct matters. There appears to be consensus on the latter: the wet market (although some do wonder about the mystery illness in Summer of 2019, in US). https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/07/11/2-dead-unknown-respiratory-virus-what-could-it-be-14147 https://www.acsh.org/news/2019/07/11/2-dead-unknown-respirat... "A news report from Virginia says that two people are dead and 18 have been hospitalized following an outbreak of an unknown respiratory infection at a retirement community. What could it possibly be?" https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Detrick#2019_closure_and_resumption_of_operations https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fort_Detrick#2019_closure_and_... So, were these "mystery illnesses" caused by vaccinated US military personnel who work in F.D. cranking around Washington DC metro area?

carrolldunham 4y ago

>If the virus had come from the lab, you'd expect the early cases to cluster around the lab. No, because it's not proposed that the virus leaked out of the lab building into the nearby air. I presume it's more like a person who worked at the lab getting infected, and then moving around the city as normal, needing only to infect one other person, anywhere in the city.

DiogenesKynikos 4y ago
And that person just happened to go all the way across the city to a wet market that sells the same sorts of animals that caused the original SARS outbreak in 2002? The earliest known cases are people who worked at the market or lived right next to it. That's exactly what you'd expect for an outbreak caused by animals at the market.

tristor 4y ago

" The closest known CoV RaTG13 strain (96.2%) to SARS-CoV-2 detected in bat anal swabs have been sequenced at the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The Wuhan CDC laboratory moved on 2nd December 2019 to a new location near the Huanan market. Such moves can be disruptive for the operations of any laboratory." [0] (page 119) [0] https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/final-joint-report_origins-studies-6-april-201.pdf?sfvrsn=4f5e5196_1&download=true#page119 https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/final-j...

DiogenesKynikos 4y ago
The Wuhan Institute of Virology, which studied RaTG13, is not the same thing as the Wuhan CDC. Two points about RaTG13: 1. RaTG13 is not the progenitor of SARS-CoV-2. It's not even the closest known relative any more. A closer relative has since been found in the wild, in bats in Laos. 2. RaTG13 doesn't even exist in live form in the Wuhan Institute of Virology. It only exists there as data on a hard drive, obtained by sequencing traces of RNA in a swab taken from a bat in the wild. A replicating form of the virus has never actually obtained. It's much more difficult to isolate a replicating virus than it is to sequence RNA in a sample. In fact, the WIV has only ever isolated three SARS-like viruses, all of which are publicly known and have been heavily publicized by the WIV (because it's a big deal, scientifically, and reflects well on them).
alphabettsy 4y ago
Wasn’t the first case in November though?