China lab leak theory: Joe Biden signs bill declassifying COVID origins intelligence

[onthedarkside]

 

President Joe Biden on Monday signed legislation ordering the declassification of information related to the origins of COVID-19, a mystery that has divided the eight U.S. government agencies investigating the source.

 

The Republican-sponsored bill, which sailed through the House and Senate without opposition, requires the director of national intelligence to release the information within 90 days.

 

The government can, however, withhold intelligence to protect how it was collected.

 

https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/politics/2023/03/20/biden-signs-bill-ordering-covid-19-origin-information-declassified/11471111002/

 

[Credo]

The US is in a precarious situation with everything from the economy to the culture wars, and yet the  right-wingers think they can legislate an answer to a question that may take many years to unravel.   

 

The most likely and plausible start of the virus is a jump from animals to humans at the wet market.  That doesn't eliminate any of the other possibilities.   It's not even known if it originated in bats.  Bats are just one of the animals that has a long history of being able to harbor and live with Coronaviruses.  

Researchers are still uncovering information about the Spanish Flu epidemic and about the Plague.   

[Chomper Higgot]

Since when did facts put a stop to Rightwing conspiracy nonsense?

 

 

[Purdey]

So, this is what Republicans are most concerned about. Placing blame.

The economy - nah. Ukraine - pff. Infrastructure - eh?

Suppose the answer is... China was the source? What then?

[Phoenix Rising]

15 minutes ago, Purdey said:

So, this is what Republicans are most concerned about. Placing blame.

The economy - nah. Ukraine - pff. Infrastructure - eh?

Suppose the answer is... China was the source? What then?

Well, Biden's laptop had parts that were made in China!

[RichardColeman]

9 hours ago, Credo said:

The most likely and plausible start of the virus is a jump from animals to humans at the wet market. 

I disagree - while back they were saying the virus was about as near to animal virus's  as humans were in DNA to something like a fish ! Would you be happy classifying something 97% as near to human as human ? 

 

They have never found the intermediary animal.

 

'My opinion' it came from the Wuhan lab to the market. 

 

Matters little in my opinion, China were totally to blame for the pandemic, by knowing of its existence and still exporting people to the world, they should not so much be sued for making it or be responsible for it, but for destroying evidence, withholding evidence and exporting it and killing millions after knowing of its existence

 

 

[Social Media]

US president Joe Biden has signed a bipartisan bill that directs the federal government to declassify as much intelligence as possible about the origins of COVID-19.

 

Since the pandemic began three years ago, its origin has been the subject of a heated scientific and political debate.

Biden signed the bill on March 20, after it passed the US House and Senate without dissent. 

 

The legislation instructs the Office of the Director of National Intelligence to declassify intelligence related to China’s Wuhan Institute of Virology. 

It cites “potential links” between the research that was done there and the outbreak of COVID-19, which the World Health Organization declared a pandemic on March 11, 2020. 

[Eleftheros]

5 hours ago, Purdey said:

Suppose the answer is... China was the source? What then?

Well, the Chinese lab in question was being funded by US government departments such as NIH and USAID - double-billed, in fact, according to CBS, for research which "involves dangerous pathogens and risky research".

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/government-agencies-may-have-been-double-billed-for-projects-in-wuhan-records-indicate/ar-AA18yT1T

 

If the whole murky story is allowed to emerge in timely fashion, then several people high up in the US medical bureaucracy. even if they are over 80 years old and have recently stepped down, are going to be in the frame for outright lying to various political entities, cover-ups and suppression of data.

[rabas]

41 minutes ago, Eleftheros said:

Well, the Chinese lab in question was being funded by US government departments such as NIH and USAID - double-billed, in fact, according to CBS, for research which "involves dangerous pathogens and risky research".

 

https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/us/government-agencies-may-have-been-double-billed-for-projects-in-wuhan-records-indicate/ar-AA18yT1T

 

If the whole murky story is allowed to emerge in timely fashion, then several people high up in the US medical bureaucracy. even if they are over 80 years old and have recently stepped down, are going to be in the frame for outright lying to various political entities, cover-ups and suppression of data.

You make the completely unfounded assumption that US bio-research involvement with China and Wuhan Labs (for what ever reason) is not in the best interests of the US and the global community.

[Credo]

7 hours ago, RichardColeman said:

I disagree - while back they were saying the virus was about as near to animal virus's  as humans were in DNA to something like a fish ! Would you be happy classifying something 97% as near to human as human ? 

 

They have never found the intermediary animal.

 

'My opinion' it came from the Wuhan lab to the market. 

 

Matters little in my opinion, China were totally to blame for the pandemic, by knowing of its existence and still exporting people to the world, they should not so much be sued for making it or be responsible for it, but for destroying evidence, withholding evidence and exporting it and killing millions after knowing of its existence

 

 

I don't quite understand what you are saying about the DNA of viruses being about as near to animal virus's as humans were in DNA to something like a fish.  Most viruses do not have DNA.  They have RNA.  Covid-19 virus is an RNA virus.   

 

Genetically, the closest virus being worked with in the lab that we know about is the bat virus, RaTG13, which is 96% identical to the human Covid.  96% is really a long way to get to Covid.  Most virologists want to see a 99% similarity to make the genetic jump to another species.  Genetically, it seems that the Raccoon dog appears to be a better fit.  

 

Scientists and researchers will continue to look at all the genetic changes that led to it being infectious to humans.  Thus far, this doesn't seem to lead to the Wuhan lab.   In addition, nothing very likely or plausible leads from the lab to the outside world.   

 

The lab is a bit of a black hole because it is large, it is hard to know everything they were doing, and the Chinese gov't may have thrown a veil over the information that would either exonerate or show a link to the virus.

 

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

The Strongest Evidence Yet That an Animal Started the Pandemic

A new analysis of genetic samples from China appears to link the pandemic’s origin to raccoon dogs.

...

A new analysis of genetic sequences collected from the market shows that raccoon dogs being illegally sold at the venue could have been carrying and possibly shedding the virus at the end of 2019. It’s some of the strongest support yet, experts told me, that the pandemic began when SARS-CoV-2 hopped from animals into humans, rather than in an accident among scientists experimenting with viruses.

 

“This really strengthens the case for a natural origin,” says Seema Lakdawala, a virologist at Emory University who wasn’t involved in the research.

 

(more)

 

https://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache:IZ8P3iTWxGQJ:https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2023/03/covid-origins-research-raccoon-dogs-wuhan-market-lab-leak/673390/

 

[TallGuyJohninBKK]

Still No Determination on COVID-19 Origin

Posted on March 2, 2023 | Updated on March 20, 2023

...

"[U.S.] Government agencies are still divided on the origin hypotheses, and the reporting so far indicates the new information, while persuasive to the Energy Department, wasn’t convincing to other agencies.

 

The Journal, as well as the New York Times and Washington Post, have reported, based on unnamed sources, that none of the other intelligence community entities has changed its assessment from the 2021 IC document in light of the new analysis.

 

Four government entities, along with the National Intelligence Council, still say the natural spillover is most likely."

 

(more)

 

https://www.factcheck.org/2023/03/scicheck-still-no-determination-on-covid-19-origin/

 

[Jaybott]

On 3/21/2023 at 3:57 PM, Purdey said:

So, this is what Republicans are most concerned about. Placing blame.

 

"The Republican-sponsored bill, which sailed through the House and Senate without opposition"

 

Looks like both sides want to know the true origin.  It's Republican sponsored because they control the house.