> I do not recall any reputable scientist completely discounting the lab origin theory Here's The Lancet in Feb 2020: > We stand together to strongly condemn

> I do not recall any reputable scientist completely discounting the lab origin theory Here's The Lancet in Feb 2020: > We stand together to strongly condemn conspiracy theories suggesting that COVID-19 does not have a natural origin. https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30418-9/fulltext https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6... The authors are in positions of considerable influence, both scientifically and directly on funding (e.g. Farrar at the Wellcome Trust). So if those don't count as "reputable", who would? > isn't the consensus still that the virus has a zoonotic origin? There is no conclusive evidence for any origin of SARS-CoV-2. All past pandemics of novel[1] viruses have been of natural origin; but the technology to engineer a novel pathogen didn't exist until recently, so that past tells us nothing about the relative risks of natural spillover vs. a research accident. 1. I say "novel" to exclude the 1977 flu pandemic, which near-certainly arose from a research accident and killed ~700k people. No one seems to care, and I'm not sure why.