Coronavirus Lab-Leak Theory Gets Another Look

[tgw]

1 minute ago, Thomas J said:

I have done some reading and yes I have read that there are thousands of infection virus in bats.  I know minks are susceptible but I have not read anything about them being consider the original source or any virus.  That still does not explain why suddenly after hundreds of years that whatever source originated the virus that it suddenly appeared.   I would have far less skepticism if the virus did not just coincidentally first appear in Wuhan a lab studying bat coronavirus.  Seems like too much of coincidence. 

 

how do you think then the spanish flu appeared, MERS, SARS, etc. ?  "thousands of years" isn't an argument.

[Thomas J]

6 minutes ago, tgw said:

Quote

that the worker at the lab was considered patient zero

do you have a source for this? yes, I ask again.

who is that "patient zero"? where is your source?

 

Now again, this is reported but not established as fact.  However if you google either patient zero or missing wuhan lab worker you get numerous sources.  Here is one. 

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/covid-19-coronavirus-wuhan-virus-lab-scientist-thought-to-be-patient-zero-still-missing/VA4TIO726U7P36ZQG2WLHDDTNA/

[Thomas J]

Just now, tgw said:

how do you think then the spanish flu appeared, MERS, SARS, etc. ?  "thousands of years" isn't an argument.

All of those were eventually traced to a source animal.  Not so with Covid.  Also again I would have a lot less skepticism if the disease suddenly appeared someplace other than a city with a Level 4 virology lab that was at the time studying coronavirus.   It is just far far far too coincidental for me to ignore.   it is possible, sure.  But I just can't buy that off all the billions of locations in this world that the virus just started to make its appearance in Wuhan versus a bat cave in the smoky mountains. 

[candide]

4 hours ago, tgw said:

also very very interesting:

https://theconversation.com/in-2010-a-virus-similar-to-sars-cov-2-was-already-present-in-cambodia-154491

 

Wow! Quite interesting indeed, and with significant implications.

Two quotes:

(1) About a possible virus origin:

"The new data thus validates the hypothesis that SARS-CoV-2-like viruses are present mostly in Southeast Asia, while SARS-CoV-like viruses are dominant in China."

 

(2) about infection rates

"Indeed, human populations in Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam appear to be much less affected by the Covid-19 pandemic than other countries in the region, such as Bangladesh, Myanmar, Malaysia, the Philippines and Indonesia. This suggests that the populations of these four countries may be benefiting from a level of herd immunity to Sarbecoviruses."

 

 

[WaveHunter]

 

21 hours ago, tgw said:

Gain-of-function experiments are typically done in biosafety level (BSL) 3+ facilities

That's actually the issue.  GoFR is far too dangerous with pathogens that must be studied in a BSL-4 lab.  The problem is that there are strong indications that it was happening in spite of that.

Edited June 22, 2021 by WaveHunter

[WaveHunter]

On 6/20/2021 at 3:06 PM, friendofthai said:

The official Chinese answer to all these claims is here:

"I'd like to stress that if the United States truly respects facts, it should open the biological lab at Fort Detrick, give more transparency to issues like its 200-plus overseas bio-labs, invite WHO experts to conduct origin-tracing in the United States, and respond to the concerns from the international community with real actions. We hope certain U.S. politicians can respect science, act with due conscience, stop shifting the blame or playing the political game, and fostering a favorable environment for international cooperation on origin-tracing and combating the virus, which is what they should do at the moment."

https://www.fmprc.gov.cn/nanhai/eng/fyrbt_1/t1847010.htm

 

...and we all know the stellar history China's government (the CCP) has for presented the transparent facts LOL!

[WaveHunter]

18 hours ago, Thomas J said:

Now again, this is reported but not established as fact.  However if you google either patient zero or missing wuhan lab worker you get numerous sources.  Here is one. 

https://www.nzherald.co.nz/world/covid-19-coronavirus-wuhan-virus-lab-scientist-thought-to-be-patient-zero-still-missing/VA4TIO726U7P36ZQG2WLHDDTNA/

Patient Zero has never been identified, and that is hugely important. 

 

What's more, patients were being admitted to Wuhan hospitals with Covid-like symptoms as early as 17 November 2019...and guess where many of them were coming from...the Wuhan Institute of Virology!

 

However, official statements by the Chinese government to the World Health Organisation reported that the first confirmed case had been diagnosed on 8 December. 

 

Chinese doctors and journalists who tried to raise the alarm about a new disease in late December were reprimanded and their records, as well as records of research at the Wuhan Lab were being destroyed per directives of the Chinese government  (CCP). 

 

Authorities did not publicly concede there was human-to-human transmission until 21 January, almost 2 months after the first suspected cases were being reported, which pretty much sealed the world's fate for the present pandemic.

 

All of this, and still international response from organizations like the WHO, or Authorities like Dr. Fauci ignored these facts, and even up to very recently continued to downplay them.

 

To say that this all is troubling and suspicious is a huge understatement.

[tgw]

56 minutes ago, WaveHunter said:

That's actually the issue.  GoFR is far too dangerous with pathogens that must be studied in a BSL-4 lab.  The problem is that there are strong indications that it was happening in spite of that.

 

that's what we say now.

before, BSL-3 was considered "very adequate" for GoF experiments, while virus samples brought in for analysis were studied in BSL-2.

 

so, if SARS-CoV-2 has been captured somewhere and brought into a BSL-2 lab for analysis, there would have been serious risks of it escaping or infecting lab workers.

 

there are 62 BSL-3 labs in China, the figure for BSL-2 is probably in the high hundreds, if not thousands.

[friendofthai]

1 hour ago, WaveHunter said:

..and we all know the stellar history China's government (the CCP) has for presented the transparent facts LOL!

China does not think it is a colony of the West. So your neocolonial "19th century style" claims look strange in the 21th century. In the new free world if you want to get something from another country - you should give something that the other country is interested in. Russia and China are very interested to know what experiments with viruses are being carried out in American military bio-labs.

Edited June 22, 2021 by friendofthai

[Thomas J]

1 hour ago, WaveHunter said:

Patient Zero has never been identified, and that is hugely import

You are correct.  However the person "reported" to be patient zero Huang Yanling was a worker at the Wuhan lab.  She is "missing"  Now unless there was a concerted effort to hide her, why would it be that her whereabouts are still unknown more than a year later. 

To me, the biggest smoking gun is the fact that of all the places in the world where the outbreak could have occurred it just coincidentally happened in Wuhan the home of the Level 4 virology lab that just again coincidentally happened to be studying coronavirus. 

To paraphrase  Clint Eastwood in one of his Dirty Harry" movies I may not have had all the evidence but when I see a naked man , with an ( aroused), carrying a butcher knife chasing a screaming woman down a dark alley I pretty safely assume he is not collecting donations for the Red Cross. 

When you see lab workers reportedly becoming ill and requiring hospitalization in November 2019 at the onset of the virus, the bat lady Shi Zengli being one of the researchers at the Wuhan lab, and  the hospitals were silenced from divulging the early reports of the virus outbreak, and the Chinese government destroying any samples of the Covid virus from its labs, I can pretty well assume they were not doing studies on the measles. 

The only way to conclusively prove would be either from lab records which have likely been destroyed or from hospital records of those first hospitalized in Wuhan and their blood tests.  Those records also have likely been destroyed.   At the very least the world community should have the opportunity to interview people including lab workers and hospital staff in Wuhan.  If the Chinese have nothing to hide, and it proves it was an act of nature well so be it.  But you only conceal something if you don't want the truth to be uncovered. 

 

Edited June 22, 2021 by Thomas J

[placeholder]

21 hours ago, Thomas J said:

All of those were eventually traced to a source animal.  Not so with Covid.  Also again I would have a lot less skepticism if the disease suddenly appeared someplace other than a city with a Level 4 virology lab that was at the time studying coronavirus.   It is just far far far too coincidental for me to ignore.   it is possible, sure.  But I just can't buy that off all the billions of locations in this world that the virus just started to make its appearance in Wuhan versus a bat cave in the smoky mountains. 

 

"But it took nearly 15 years and extensive animal sampling to find a closely related virus in bats. It was Shi Zheng-Li who led the team that sampled thousands of bats in remote caves in China. And even though they found⁵ all the genetic components of the SARS virus, they did not find one virus with the same genetic make-up.

Scientists say that pinpointing the animal source of SARS-CoV-2 could take just as long."

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-01541-z

[WaveHunter]

1 hour ago, Thomas J said:

You are correct.  However the person "reported" to be patient zero Huang Yanling was a worker at the Wuhan lab.  She is "missing"  Now unless there was a concerted effort to hide her, why would it be that her whereabouts are still unknown more than a year later. 

To me, the biggest smoking gun is the fact that of all the places in the world where the outbreak could have occurred it just coincidentally happened in Wuhan the home of the Level 4 virology lab that just again coincidentally happened to be studying coronavirus. 

To paraphrase  Clint Eastwood in one of his Dirty Harry" movies I may not have had all the evidence but when I see a naked man , with an ( aroused), carrying a butcher knife chasing a screaming woman down a dark alley I pretty safely assume he is not collecting donations for the Red Cross. 

When you see lab workers reportedly becoming ill and requiring hospitalization in November 2019 at the onset of the virus, the bat lady Shi Zengli being one of the researchers at the Wuhan lab, and  the hospitals were silenced from divulging the early reports of the virus outbreak, and the Chinese government destroying any samples of the Covid virus from its labs, I can pretty well assume they were not doing studies on the measles. 

The only way to conclusively prove would be either from lab records which have likely been destroyed or from hospital records of those first hospitalized in Wuhan and their blood tests.  Those records also have likely been destroyed.   At the very least the world community should have the opportunity to interview people including lab workers and hospital staff in Wuhan.  If the Chinese have nothing to hide, and it proves it was an act of nature well so be it.  But you only conceal something if you don't want the truth to be uncovered. 

 

LOL...I like your Dirty Harry analogy ???? .  I wish more world leaders took a "Dirty Harry" approach with simple and brutally direct ways of summing things up instead of the diplomatically correct but totally weak BS we get instead.  Clint Eastwood would make a great US President.  "'Bout time this town had a new sheriff." ????

 

BTW, totally agree with you...way too many blatant smoking guns in this whole debate for anyone to still claim it all is merely an unfounded conspiracy theory.

 

It's like we are now living in a bizarre new world where logical thought is meaningless.

Edited June 22, 2021 by WaveHunter

[thaibeachlovers]

On 6/21/2021 at 8:08 PM, tgw said:

Quote

the patient believed to be the first coronavirus case was not also a worker at the Wuhan lab.  

and I will need a source for this

Indeed.

[thaibeachlovers]

23 hours ago, friendofthai said:

China does not think it is a colony of the West. So your neocolonial "19th century style" claims look strange in the 21th century. In the new free world if you want to get something from another country - you should give something that the other country is interested in. Russia and China are very interested to know what experiments with viruses are being carried out in American military bio-labs.

If it can be proven that corona originated in the US labs that would be a valid point, but so far only the Chinese ( to my knowledge ) have accused the US of originating corona.

 

 

[Harry Om]

"I was the lead China correspondent for the journal Science during the H7N9 outbreak. Many times over the past year, amid seesawing and often misleading media coverage of the search for the origins of SARS-CoV-2, I have thought back on one particular story I wrote in 2013.

I profiled a flu researcher who was helping authorities contain the spread of H7N9. Even as she became the point person for the outbreak, she was at the center of a scientific controversy for an experiment she had done on another avian flu virus. That work involved tweaking pathogens in order to study how they might become more contagious, a type of study that is often lumped under the shorthand “gain of function.” Proponents of such experiments argued that a better understanding of how viruses are transmitted from one species to the next could help public health experts ward off natural outbreaks. Critics worried that instead of aiding in global health, her research could spark a pandemic."

 

https://theintercept.com/2021/06/19/lab-leak-covid-origins-virology/

[Harry Om]

"Explosive new claims have emerged that China deleted a data set containing covid sequences from early in the Wuhan epidemic that could provide vital clues in the search for the ‘Patient Zero’ that sparked a worldwide pandemic.
The scientific investigation also suggests that the virus was circulating in Wuhan before it was detected in the local wet markets.

It suggests the early covid viruses investigated by the World Health Organisation are not fully representative of the virus strains circulating in those early months. The virus has now killed nearly four million people.
Professor Jesse Bloom, an associate professor at the Seattle-based Fred Hutch Cancer Research Center, released the new research on Wednesday.

It reveals a data set containing SARS-CoV-2 sequences from early in the Wuhan epidemic has been deleted from the National Institute of Health‘s Sequence Read Archive."

 

https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/world/explosive-claims-china-deleted-early-wuhan-covid-data/news-story/5f72eb14c7bf73d6e4a74a67a185fb1c

[Pattaya Spotter]

Where Did the Coronavirus Come From? What We Already Know Is Troubling.

 

There were curious characteristics about the H1N1 influenza pandemic of 1977-78 which...killed an estimated 700,000 people around the world. For one, it almost exclusively affected people in their mid-20s or younger. Scientists discovered another oddity that could explain the first: It was virtually identical to a strain that circulated in the 1950s....[b]ut how on earth had it remained so steady genetically, since viruses continually mutate? Scientists guessed that it had been frozen in a lab. It was often found to be sensitive to temperature, something expected for viruses used in vaccine research. It was only in 2004 that a prominent virologist, Peter Palese, wrote that Chi-Ming Chu, a respected virologist and a former member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told him that “the introduction of this 1977 H1N1 virus” was indeed thought to be due to vaccine trials involving “the challenge of several thousand military recruits with live H1N1 virus.” For the first time, science itself seemed to have caused a pandemic while trying to prepare for it [Emphasis added]...

 

https://nyti.ms/3xOXC3q

Edited June 26, 2021 by Pattaya Spotter

[rabas]

21 minutes ago, Pattaya Spotter said:

Where Did the Coronavirus Come From? What We Already Know Is Troubling.

 

There were curious characteristics about the H1N1 influenza pandemic of 1977-78 which...killed an estimated 700,000 people around the world. For one, it almost exclusively affected people in their mid-20s or younger. Scientists discovered another oddity that could explain the first: It was virtually identical to a strain that circulated in the 1950s....[b]ut how on earth had it remained so steady genetically, since viruses continually mutate? Scientists guessed that it had been frozen in a lab. It was often found to be sensitive to temperature, something expected for viruses used in vaccine research. It was only in 2004 that a prominent virologist, Peter Palese, wrote that Chi-Ming Chu, a respected virologist and a former member of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told him that “the introduction of this 1977 H1N1 virus” was indeed thought to be due to vaccine trials involving “the challenge of several thousand military recruits with live H1N1 virus.” For the first time, science itself seemed to have caused a pandemic while trying to prepare for it [Emphasis added]...

 

https://nyti.ms/3xOXC3q

I can't access NYT but this has been well known for a long time as the 1977 Russian flu pandemic that killed an estimated 700,000 people worldwide. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1977_Russian_flu

 

"Genetic analysis and several unusual characteristics of the 1977 Russian flu have prompted many researchers to speculate that the virus was released to the public through a laboratory accident or resulted from a live-vaccine trial escape^"

 

[Pattaya Spotter]

1 hour ago, rabas said:

I can't access NYT but this has been well known for a long time as the 1977 Russian flu pandemic that killed an estimated 700,000 people worldwide. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1977_Russian_flu

 

"Genetic analysis and several unusual characteristics of the 1977 Russian flu have prompted many researchers to speculate that the virus was released to the public through a laboratory accident or resulted from a live-vaccine trial escape^"

 

Sorry for that...that's just the starting point for the article. 

[tgw]

On 6/21/2021 at 7:28 PM, candide said:

Wow! Quite interesting indeed, and with significant implications.

Two quotes:

(1) About a possible virus origin:

"The new data thus validates the hypothesis that SARS-CoV-2-like viruses are present mostly in Southeast Asia, while SARS-CoV-like viruses are dominant in China."

 

(2) about infection rates

"Indeed, human populations in Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam appear to be much less affected by the Covid-19 pandemic than other countries in the region, such as Bangladesh, Myanmar, Malaysia, the Philippines and Indonesia. This suggests that the populations of these four countries may be benefiting from a level of herd immunity to Sarbecoviruses."

 

 

actually, it just occured to me that there is a third implication.

if the populations of Cambodia, Laos, Thailand and Vietnam have some herd immunity against covid, then it's one argument more in favor of the lab leak, because the virus would be unlikely to cause an outbreak among a population with immunity.

[friendofthai]

On 6/20/2021 at 6:58 PM, tgw said:

 

let's not forget where the outbreak occured: Wuhan.

It is like saying "Ha ha ha. It does not matter what is said in China. We say the virus came from Wuhan. Any other opinion is just not allowed to be cited in any credible news source".

This is a nice point of view to follow because the US are strong enough to blame China. But what if this is the CONSOLIDATED position of China and Russia? Surprise! Yes, at least 2 influential Russian politicians  ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergey_Naryshkin  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vyacheslav_Volodin ) have said the same already.
What will you do if Chinese and Russian aircrafts together destroy, for instance, the US military bio-lab in Almaty city (Kazakhstan) ? Think twice before playing this game.

[Salerno]

Moving from propaganda to threats now?

[tgw]

1 hour ago, friendofthai said:

It is like saying "Ha ha ha. It does not matter what is said in China. We say the virus came from Wuhan. Any other opinion is just not allowed to be cited in any credible news source".

This is a nice point of view to follow because the US are strong enough to blame China. But what if this is the CONSOLIDATED position of China and Russia? Surprise! Yes, at least 2 influential Russian politicians  ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sergey_Naryshkin  https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Vyacheslav_Volodin ) have said the same already.
What will you do if Chinese and Russian aircrafts together destroy, for instance, the US military bio-lab in Almaty city (Kazakhstan) ? Think twice before playing this game.

 

what a nonsensical post - I gotta check your other contributions, lol.

 

the virus came from elsewhere (originally most probably from bats in the Yunnan/Laos/Cambodia/Northeastern Thailand region), but the breakout occured in Wuhan.

How did the virus get to Wuhan?

2 possibilities:

- a traveler or goods infected with the virus brought it there, not infecting anyone on their way to Wuhan

- the virus was taken as a sample from its original region and then a "whoopsie" happened in a Wuhan lab

I don't believe a second that the outbreak was intentional.

 

The Russians also deny involvement in shooting down MH-17. So much for a credible source.

Don't believe any news that has been edited by government channels or politicians. They are all liars.

Edited June 29, 2021 by tgw

[Felt 35]

Oh well... my grandson will likely know in 2121 and when he sit down with his family and tell tales and history from his ancestors he will probably remark that grandfather was actually right with his theory about the  Covid -19 pandemic origin which killed more than hundred's of millions of people worldwide and started with a lab leak in China ????

[Susco]

1 minute ago, friendofthai said:

This so called "Investigation" is a threat actually. Because it suggests that China will pay reparations and contributions to the winner of the "investigation" - the US.

 

Are you sure your username wasn't a mistake, and should be friendofchina?

[Pattaya Spotter]

 

China’s rebuff of WHO’s new Covid probe alarms experts

 

Leading U.S. infectious disease experts are warning that China's rejection of a World Health Organization plan for another Covid-19 investigation inside the country threatens to deny the world critical data needed to identify and head off future pandemics. And experts told POLITICO that the denial of access to Wuhan...deepens growing suspicion the Chinese government is attempting to cover up the possibility that the virus was intentionally engineered.

 

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/25/who-china-investigation-covid-probe-500711

Edited July 26, 2021 by Pattaya Spotter

[tgw]

On 7/26/2021 at 9:33 AM, Pattaya Spotter said:

 

China’s rebuff of WHO’s new Covid probe alarms experts

 

Leading U.S. infectious disease experts are warning that China's rejection of a World Health Organization plan for another Covid-19 investigation inside the country threatens to deny the world critical data needed to identify and head off future pandemics. And experts told POLITICO that the denial of access to Wuhan...deepens growing suspicion the Chinese government is attempting to cover up the possibility that the virus was intentionally engineered.

 

https://www.politico.com/news/2021/07/25/who-china-investigation-covid-probe-500711

"intentionally engineered" doesn't mean "intentionally released" and is close to being a misleading misrepresentation of potential facts => propaganda.

 

what is meant is that the virus or a precursor virus may have been engineered, possibly within WIV or another lab there, possibly for vaccine research purposes.

 

[Scott]

A post violating Fair Use Policy has been removed.  

[placeholder]

Researchers have discovered Covid viruses in Laos that have spikes that close resemble the spikes of covid19. These were features that proponents of the Wuhan Lab theory have claimed did not exist in nature in Coronaviruses. Their study has not yet been published.

 

https://www.nytimes.com/2021/10/14/science/bat-coronaviruses-lab-leak.html

 

[Chomper Higgot]

I think I’ll wait for the outcome of the investigation.