EPTCoronavirus and You - Page 570
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Any and all updates regarding the COVID-19 will need a source provided. Please do your part in helping us to keep this thread maintainable and under control. It is YOUR responsibility to fully read through the sources that you link, and you MUST provide a brief summary explaining what the source is about. Do not expect other people to do the work for you. Conspiracy theories and fear mongering will absolutely not be tolerated in this thread. Expect harsh mod actions if you try to incite fear needlessly. This is not a politics thread! You are allowed to post information regarding politics if it's related to the coronavirus, but do NOT discuss politics in here. Added a disclaimer on page 662. Many need to post better. | ||
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Mohdoo
United States15466 Posts
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BlackJack
United States10335 Posts
Newly released emails to Fauci and Frances Collins show that scientists at the start of the pandemic privately favored the lab leak theory for the origin of COVID-19 but they feared open discussion of the theory could cause "harm to science in general and harm to science in china" and damage "international harmony." The emails were sent in response to a teleconference between 12 scientists including Sir Patrick Vallance, the Government's chief scientific adviser, on February 1. The emails show that by February 2 2020, scientists were already trying to shut down the debate into the laboratory leak theory. An email from Dr Ron Fouchier to Sir Jeremy said: “Further debate about such accusations would unnecessarily distract top researchers from their active duties and do unnecessary harm to science in general and science in China in particular.” Dr Collins, former director of the NIH, replied to Sir Jeremy stating: “I share your view that a swift convening of experts in a confidence-inspiring framework is needed or the voices of conspiracy will quickly dominate, doing great potential harm to science and international harmony.” So February 1st scientists are saying they favor the lab leak theory 70:30 or 60:40 and the very next day they are talking about how to shut down discussion of the lab leak theory. Eventually we saw that there was a big push to label the lab leak hypothesis as conspiratorial or racist. Absolutely disgusting, honestly. It's amazing how many people still revere Fauci. Science should concern itself with discovering the truth. It should not concern itself whether the truth might harm their science projects in China and then try to push a narrative that is more politically convenient for themselves. The fact that people still haven't caught on that these people have no loyalty to the truth is astounding. | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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Slydie
1913 Posts
On January 15 2022 09:20 BlackJack wrote: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/01/11/scientists-believed-covid-leaked-wuhan-lab-feared-debate-could/ Newly released emails to Fauci and Frances Collins show that scientists at the start of the pandemic privately favored the lab leak theory for the origin of COVID-19 but they feared open discussion of the theory could cause "harm to science in general and harm to science in china" and damage "international harmony." So February 1st scientists are saying they favor the lab leak theory 70:30 or 60:40 and the very next day they are talking about how to shut down discussion of the lab leak theory. Eventually we saw that there was a big push to label the lab leak hypothesis as conspiratorial or racist. Absolutely disgusting, honestly. It's amazing how many people still revere Fauci. Science should concern itself with discovering the truth. It should not concern itself whether the truth might harm their science projects in China and then try to push a narrative that is more politically convenient for themselves. The fact that people still haven't caught on that these people have no loyalty to the truth is astounding. No, science is often more about nuance and complicated, changing explanations than absolute truth, which is why bullshit simple, non-scientific narratives can be so compelling. We still don't know the truth about the origin of this virus, and they certainly didn't back then. They wanted to avoid harmful speculation with incomplete information, "loyalty to the truth" has nothing to do with that. | ||
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
Fauci was once widely respected, but it's been clear for a while now that he has broad conflicts of interest and is playing reputation management in a lot of his public engagements. He really should just stop playing celebrity. | ||
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RKC
2848 Posts
But wouldn't identifying the root cause of the virus and discovery of patient zero (however difficult as may be) help in developing a vaccine and ending the pandemic? | ||
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Mohdoo
United States15466 Posts
On January 15 2022 09:20 BlackJack wrote: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/01/11/scientists-believed-covid-leaked-wuhan-lab-feared-debate-could/ Newly released emails to Fauci and Frances Collins show that scientists at the start of the pandemic privately favored the lab leak theory for the origin of COVID-19 but they feared open discussion of the theory could cause "harm to science in general and harm to science in china" and damage "international harmony." So February 1st scientists are saying they favor the lab leak theory 70:30 or 60:40 and the very next day they are talking about how to shut down discussion of the lab leak theory. Eventually we saw that there was a big push to label the lab leak hypothesis as conspiratorial or racist. Absolutely disgusting, honestly. It's amazing how many people still revere Fauci. Science should concern itself with discovering the truth. It should not concern itself whether the truth might harm their science projects in China and then try to push a narrative that is more politically convenient for themselves. The fact that people still haven't caught on that these people have no loyalty to the truth is astounding. Lab leak theory makes more sense than anything else. It will take a great deal of evidence to convince me otherwise. Science without accountability and truth isn’t science. Just another example of Fauci being a repugnant piece of trash. He harms science more than he helps it, by a long shot. On January 15 2022 09:58 LegalLord wrote: The complete 180 of the mainstream view on the lab leak theory - from "censor it all, it's fake news" under Trump to "it's so obviously accurate" under Biden - was quite impressive to see. I suppose our leading science people (or science policy people perhaps?) think that opportunistic lying (this, of course, but also the "masks aren't useful" item early in the pandemic) isn't harmful to science. Fauci was once widely respected, but it's been clear for a while now that he has broad conflicts of interest and is playing reputation management in a lot of his public engagements. He really should just stop playing celebrity. The moment I learned there was a virology institute studying corona viruses in Wuhan, I was 100% convinced of lab leak. Chinese science has a well deserved reputation of incompetence and falsifying data. | ||
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Amui
Canada10567 Posts
On January 15 2022 09:20 BlackJack wrote: https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2022/01/11/scientists-believed-covid-leaked-wuhan-lab-feared-debate-could/ Newly released emails to Fauci and Frances Collins show that scientists at the start of the pandemic privately favored the lab leak theory for the origin of COVID-19 but they feared open discussion of the theory could cause "harm to science in general and harm to science in china" and damage "international harmony." So February 1st scientists are saying they favor the lab leak theory 70:30 or 60:40 and the very next day they are talking about how to shut down discussion of the lab leak theory. Eventually we saw that there was a big push to label the lab leak hypothesis as conspiratorial or racist. Absolutely disgusting, honestly. It's amazing how many people still revere Fauci. Science should concern itself with discovering the truth. It should not concern itself whether the truth might harm their science projects in China and then try to push a narrative that is more politically convenient for themselves. The fact that people still haven't caught on that these people have no loyalty to the truth is astounding. The bigotry aspect of it was definitely very alive and well for the start. Many of my friends and colleagues who look even remotely oriental experienced it. There are a few billion people around the world who look remotely oriental, and all but a handful are completely innocent of wrongdoing for causing Covid. That being said damaging international relations shouldn't even matter any more. Kill a citizen in some other country with a drone strike, and that'll damage international relations, but kill tens or hundreds of thousands(at that point in time, now millions) and it's "bad for international relations" to even investigate why it happened. Just silly. I honestly think it's 50-50 on the origin, whether it was a lab leak(research, not bioweapon, pretty sure there would be better diseases to bioengineer for that purpose), or somebody eating a bat. There are definitely a handful of people in China who could easily confirm if it was a lab leak or not(specifically the people working in that lab, as well as various government officials who would've investigated), but I doubt it would ever come out whether they were working on Covid or not since people like not being in | ||
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LegalLord
United Kingdom13775 Posts
On January 15 2022 10:31 RKC wrote: I'm not qualified enough to judge the lab leak theory, and lean towards a presumption of falsity unless some credible evidence shows otherwise. That's a completely fair position to take. Long as you don't also assume that anyone who has the contrary view is engaging in "corvid misinformation" as was popular in the early months of the pandemic. The theory certainly has enough credibility to be taken seriously, at least. | ||
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RKC
2848 Posts
On January 15 2022 10:38 LegalLord wrote: That's a completely fair position to take. Long as you don't also assume that anyone who has the contrary view is engaging in "corvid misinformation" as was popular in the early months of the pandemic. The theory certainly has enough credibility to be taken seriously, at least. Actually my next line (which you omitted) reinforces this point. That given the chance (even if low) to discover the root cause of the virus and developing a vaccine, experts should still investigate this theory regardless of credibility. My personal suspicion is that if the lab theory is true, the rabbit hole goes even deeper and may implicate the medical research sector beyond just China. That may explain why the US is also quick to shut down this line of inquiry. Also politics. Fear of anti-Asian backlash? Give me a break. Of course the risk is real, and I've been especially vocal about racism in my previous postings. But I highly doubt Western governments were truly concerned about this risk, more like an excuse... (Yeah, that's how lowly I think about them treating anti-Asian hatred as a serious issue as opposed to other forms of racism, but let's not digress to politics...) | ||
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JimmiC
Canada22817 Posts
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WombaT
Northern Ireland24381 Posts
I can’t recall the various timelines and progress, but especially if the lab leak was the case, China was privy to information in the early stages, I could see a pragmatic reason to not piss off the famously thick-skinned Chinese state. To paraphrase George Bush there are mostly known unknowns here. There is a patient zero but who, and do the Chinese themselves know? Crucially, can you actually investigate the issue and to what extent? And what is incumbent on Chinese cooperation? I have zero idea what is plausible in this domain from the outside looking in if China doesn’t open the gates. I’d be for an investigation incidentally, but if you can’t actually investigate it then I’m not sure prudent it would be to have high ranking and visible figures across these fields indulging in (reasonable, plausible) speculation publicly at a time where international cooperation is paramount. If you have dirt, or really want to go ham on actually investigating the issue sure, go for it, if you don’t you’re making a diplomatic mess for no tangible gain. I would add that, as much as I wished some lunatics got censored way more often for way more, I highly disagree with social media’s ‘misinformation’ policies in this domain. They should relate entirely to concrete claims not theories anyway. Combing verifiable things with some logical deduction and concluding that the lab leak theory is at the very least plausible is not remotely the same as just outright talking bollocks and posting your ‘proof’ of a Chinese bioweapon Joe Public should be free to indulge in asking such questions and speculating, ESPECIALLY when it’s something entirely plausible, but currently unprovable. | ||
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Lmui
Canada6210 Posts
Apart from the pressure on hospitals due to the combination of high spread and staff being sick, Omicron is looking promising. Highly vaccinated populations are getting through the wave in pretty decent shape, because vaccinated individuals are less likely to need hospitalization compared to event Delta, and are in the hospital for an average time of less than half of Delta. This is true in data from my province, Canada, and other countries like UK/Denmark. Delta still makes up a majority of hospitalization for covid, and ICU admissions. The vaccination of people age 5-11 and booster doses for everyone else is choking Delta out of areas with over 90% vaccinated. In unvaccinated populations though, it's just as deadly as OG covid, which unfortunately, is the thing we stopped the world for back in 2020. | ||
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justanothertownie
16316 Posts
On January 15 2022 10:32 Mohdoo wrote: The moment I learned there was a virology institute studying corona viruses in Wuhan, I was 100% convinced of lab leak. Chinese science has a well deserved reputation of incompetence and falsifying data. Absolutely, from my personal experience with Chinese research I can tell that it is surprising this hasn't happened more often. Which is why this was always a possibility to me. But obviously we don't know and probably also never will so antagonizing China about this seems kind of pointless. I also do not think I am able to evaluate the claims which were made by other scientists about the nature of the virus due to my lacking knowledge in this field. | ||
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BlackJack
United States10335 Posts
On January 13 2022 21:34 BlackJack wrote: With what I am seeing I suspect this wave in Cali may have peaked already or is peaking this week. Again, very unimpressed, basically what you'd see in a typical flu season except the flu season would last for several weeks longer. Update to this. Wave appears to be well over. Back to back days where it's all quiet on the Western front. The actual peak may have been around January 6-8. Evidently they have been testing wastewater/sewage for levels of COVID biomarkers and they peaked around that time in the Bay Area. It's quite genius when you think about it. Not everybody goes to get a COVID test but everyone shits so it's a pretty good way to know the prevalence in the community. | ||
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SC-Shield
Bulgaria817 Posts
On January 15 2022 10:32 Mohdoo wrote: Lab leak theory makes more sense than anything else. It will take a great deal of evidence to convince me otherwise. Science without accountability and truth isn’t science. Just another example of Fauci being a repugnant piece of trash. He harms science more than he helps it, by a long shot. The moment I learned there was a virology institute studying corona viruses in Wuhan, I was 100% convinced of lab leak. Chinese science has a well deserved reputation of incompetence and falsifying data. Say you're right about lab leak theory, how does that help in light of current events? There is no switch off button. What are you going to do? Sue China? Our #1 priority must be to stop the virus. Discovering how it evolved/came to be is #2 priority in my opinion. | ||
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RKC
2848 Posts
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maybenexttime
Poland5496 Posts
On January 15 2022 10:38 LegalLord wrote: That's a completely fair position to take. Long as you don't also assume that anyone who has the contrary view is engaging in "corvid misinformation" as was popular in the early months of the pandemic. The theory certainly has enough credibility to be taken seriously, at least. Why do people keep repeating that? The conspiracy theory was that it was a human-engineered bio-weapon developed at the institute that was then accidentally/purposely leaked. Before they knew any specifics, the scientists had a hunch that the lab was a plausible source of the virus because other coronaviruses were studied there and the location was far from natural reservoirs. Once the virus was sequenced, we learned that its genome looked natural and that it wasn't closely related to the viruses studied at the lab. That made the animal origin hypothesis more plausible. | ||
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justanothertownie
16316 Posts
On January 15 2022 20:52 RKC wrote: Find patient zero, find the cure. How? | ||
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Belisarius
Australia6225 Posts
That nature paper early in 2020 that tried to debunk it was a really serious mistake. It's always difficult to prove a negative, and declaring that they had done so on on such sparse evidence made politics out of the science, with consequences for our long-term credibility. Same with the muzzled WHO probe that still tried to present outcomes rather than just admit that the hosts made their job impossible. We'll never know, but my personal feeling is a 70/30 at least. | ||
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