Well for one thing there’s no evidence of a single case from the virology lab versus the majority of early cases having a direct connection to the wet market.
Yes I know some will just speculate that China is covering up such cases, including somehow retroactively removing such cases from the employee rolls, but again this is the standard unfalsifiable CT position.
As someone living in China during this, it has been a weird year because it’s been a non stop stream of CTs and it doesn’t seem to matter that none of the last ones panned out.
Remember the pictures of people supposedly dropping dead in the street from covid (as China had obviously lied about the severity of the virus). Or the virus was engineered (despite this being ruled out by virologists worldwide). Or that millions must be dying of covid in China and they are lying about controlling it (strange that none of the foreign journalists reporting from China have been able to even find one unreported case).
Anyway, rant over.
I would agree with an independent inquiry just because this has been a devastating pandemic and we need to know as much as we can. But I would disagree with the suggestion that the claims of virology lab vs wet market have equal empirical support.
You put the question mark on the statement, and a period on the question. The answer to the actual question is no. My comment on your statement is that JAQ isn’t a productive way to approach life.
Seeing as the majority of cases are asymptomatic, if there were to be a singular link to the lab this is most likely what we’d expect.
I don’t think that pattern is particularly informative by itself.
The virus is not thought to have arisen in the wet market, that is merely the initial super-spreader event. Other initial cases have no connection to the wet market. They have equal empirical support in that there is very little in either case.
Let me explain, I had to cut the media out of the post. There was 3 or 4 videos, UnicefGates Foundation and 2 others. Discourse would not allow. I had company and taking care of a toddler. My apologies and combined with distraction.
On another link to the funding for BMG most funding is from pharmaceuticals, media and Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation. That is why I said there was a conflict of interest. That is why I called you on your cite. The article was shown in the best light to serve the purpose of their initiative and further the agenda of global healthcare.
Firstly, whether the majority of cases are asymptomatic is actually unknown; one of the largest reviews of research to date actually suggests this is false.
Secondly the more important point is that there is nothing linking it to the virology lab. No particular reason to even think about the lab at this time. Whereas lots of data and reasons to suggest the wet market.
More than 2/3 of early cases had a direct link to the wet market, and given that we of course now know it is human-to-human transmissible, it’s not surprising that some did not have such a direct link. To say that this data means that wet market vs anywhere else has equal support is the most disingenuous statement I’ve heard since the last time Ted Cruz spoke.
While you claim to be JAQ, your framing definitely seems motivated to me.
No-one working in the lab got sick? Well, many people are asymptomatic.
Lots of people at the wet market got sick? Well it could have been seeded from the lab…scientists selling biohazardous meat is a thing, right?
The WHO found nothing? The Chinese government just really covered up well. Just like they can hide millions of dead covid victims.
To reiterate, I’d be all in favor of an audit. I’d be willing to bet money they wouldn’t find a link to the lab, but I would follow the data. You will just choose to believe what you want to believe.
I will note that I posted some evidence that the virus evolved naturally in humans outside the wet market. For example, studying the evolution of certain strains suggests that it was slowly spreading in China outside of Wuhan and someone brought it to the wet market creating a superspreader event.
you are correct. It is not a majority but it is common enough to be relevant.
lots of data to show it arose at the wet market? or that it was the first big spreading event? The difference is important.
So you agree that the possibility exists that it arose elsewhere, found its way, human-to-human, to the wet market and spread from there?
So find someone who actually said that and complain to them.
I think the purely natural hypothesis is more likely than the lab leak. I said, very carefuly, that at this moment, in my opinion they have equal empirical evidence. And that amount is very little for each.
For the natural hypothesis we are looking for a trail of hosts and infections and intermediates that lead us to the wet market.
For the lab leak we are looking for the virus to be placed in the lab with a opportunity for outbreak there.
In neither case do we yet have the evidence needed to make that assessment with any confidence.
I don’t claim to be JAQ and my only motivation is to come to a solid conclusion based on the best evidence we can assemble.
And now you are just being downright disingenuous. None of that is a fair reflection of the arguments I’ve made in this thread. I’ll stand on every word that I’ve written and where a correction is needed I’ve made it. My words are there and you can go back and check them.
No, completely wrong. I’ll believe the evidence and follow it where it takes me.
My point…from the start and consistently throughout, is that in order to follow the data, the data needs to be made available in the first place.
You say you’d be in favour of an audit…why? What form should that take? What would be your reaction if the Chinese authorities continue to block such access?
I recall asking you where in those cites it said that and you didn’t reply. There
were diagrams but no explanations of what you claim they were concluding.
Could you please have a look and re-post, perhaps with the abstract?
That would be strong evidence of the natural hypothesis and it would be useful to make it clear for everyone.
Saying the empirical evidence is the same should be the same as saying that they have the same support. I mean, that would be a rational argument based on a faulty premise.
Right now you have an irrational argument and a faulty premise.
I guess I should just leave you to go have a fight with your own brain.
no, absolutely not. this is important to understand.
If I have two six-sided dice in one cup and one six-sided dice in the other. I shake them both and cover them with the cups.
The cup with two dice has a higher probability of showing at least one six. I would not be surprised to see most people saying that, if they were betting people I’d expect them put their money on it and I would too.
However, absent any cheating or loaded dice, Both cups present exactly the same amount of empirical evidence until such point as we uncover the dice.
Now do you understand why I said what I said?
what exactly do you think my premise is?
Your paraphrasing is wildly inaccurate and your reading of my words is hopelessly incomplete. My point was that, If (you noted the “If” I hope) a person in the lab were infected and the single point of contact with the wet market super-spreading then there is no guarentee that they would be symptomatic as a good proportion of people are not.
That’s all. That’s just a statement of fact and one that would have to be considered in any investigation. It is neither my theory of choice nor the only way in which transmission from lab to wet market could happen.
Does this mean Bill Gates is somehow behind coronavirus? Some folks in this thread would have us believe that we can’t rule out the coincidence. I am not one of them.
The speculation is that someone brought it to the wet market. This created a superspreader event that seeded several countries. Enough to create a pandemic.
There are three types of evidence I presented in several posts. 1) genetic analysis of the virus, its evolution and mutation rate suggests outside of Wuhan and before Dec. 2019, 2) seroprevalence in the US and Italy suggesting community spread much earlier than originally thought (as early as Sept 2019)., and 3) Yunnan province miners having Covid-19-like disease after being in a cave in which the Sars-CoV-2 bat strain exists. This means that some intermediary animal was already infected and virus mutated in these animals so that they could infect humans. This is if you believe the the miners had Covid-19. There is no molecular evidence of that.
It was the research by Peter Forster. He and colleagues performed phylogenetic network analysis of sars-cov-2 strains derived from early in the pandemic. They organized the strains into three types and compared them to the originator bat virus (the same sequenced by Zengli in Wuhan). He labeled the clusters A, B, and C with A being closest to the bat sequence. Wuhan had more B than A while A was scattered throughout China. B is the cluster that moved into Europe and the US. B strains also had higher mutation rates. I wonder if B was also more contagious (just speculating) and that’s why it took over. A and C declined rapidly. Based on the mutation rate, Forster suggests that some form of SAR-CoV-2 was around at least since Sept. 2019, maybe summer 2019. https://www.usnews.com/news/best-countries/articles/2020-05-13/scientist-suggests-coronavirus-originated-outside-of-wuhan https://www.pnas.org/content/117/17/9241 https://www.pnas.org/content/117/23/12524
Sept 2019 coincides with the seroprevalence of anti-sars-cov-2 antibodies in Northern Italians which peaked around October, disappeared, then surged in Feb. 2020. (True ELISA testing isn’t the greatest but they tested several months.) These were people who had volunteered for a completely different trial and were not necessarily sick with a respiratory illness. https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0300891620974755
Finally, there’s evidence that there was a low level of community spread of Covid in the western US as early as the second week in Dec. 2019. It had already moved into the midwest by Jan 2020. Again, this is testing for antibodies in blood donors.
No I don’t think Bill Gates is responsible for Covid. I will say all of the players are well positioned to make billions of dollars on just the covid vaccine alone. For each infectious pandemic from now on needing a vaccine and possible yearly boosters. They set it up so they and their associates would financially benifit themselves. Not only that it was set up as a 501.c or a variant. Laws were made in 1986 to be held from being sued in 1986, for injury and death. Our US government passed that law. The finiancial amount is capped. No taxes on 501 c. business. 100 % greed absolutely.
The empirical data are not the same as we know that there are two dice. So if you’re saying that the empirical data to suggest the wet market from a natural source is the much stronger hypothesis right now, then sure I agree. Your suggestion earlier was that there is no such data.
That the data equally supports the laboratory as an origin vs the market.
It’s not true; the mass of early cases at the wet market vs none from the laboratory is the key observation here.
Let’s just say that whether I paraphrased you accurately or not is there in black and white for all to see in my previous post.
Regarding whether I saw the “if”, I don’t see how that would even make a difference right now. If it is a single source from the lab…well that’s the hypothesis we were all already discussing.
If it is not a single source from the lab…then the complete lack of evidence is even more telling.
You’ve missed the point of my analogy. The increased number of dice represents the increased opportunity space for the wet market natural pathway v the lab. Feel free to increase the number of dice accordingly, the point still holds.
The “six” represents confirmation that it was the origin of the virus.
So how much hard, empirical data do you have, in either case, that a six has been rolled? Not probability, data. You have none until you investigate and look at both.
If you cannot grasp this you cannot grasp my point.
There is no data that proves a natural pathway from animals to the wet market, there is no data that proves a pathway from the lab to the wet market.
No that isn’t my premise. There is no data that shows the either the lab or the market as the origin. It was the first superspreader event that we know of but opinion now seems to be that it wasn’t the origin, It came from elsewhere, currently unknown.
Something seeded the event at the market and in my opinion is was likely natural, that seems more probable to me but there is no empirical evidence
that confirms it.
NPR is reporting that investigators with the WHO are saying that the likely origin of the SARS-Cov-2 virus is from wildlife farms in the Yunnan region, where a bat corona virus similar to SARS-Cov-2 was found. They also have evidence that these farms were supplying the infamous wet market in Wuhan.
After the outbreak, theses farms were directed by the government to destroy all of their animals, and shutdown.
The farms had originally been setup by the Chinese government as a way to enhance rural economies. So people looking to blame the Chinese government, may be right.
I didn’t find any obvious publication directly from the WHO, but the investigators are named in the article, and were speaking on the record.
“In the live animal section, they had many positive samples,” Wang says. “They even have two samples from which they could isolate live virus.”
And so Daszak and others on the WHO team believe that the wildlife farms provided a perfect conduit between a coronavirus-infected bat in Yunnan (or neighboring Myanmar) and a Wuhan animal market.
It’s looking more likely covid-19 underwent gain-of-function research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology and escaped. Otherwise lots of coincidences.
I more or less trust BBC:
Maybe gain-of-function research should be done more carefully.