So... What if China's Wuhan Institute of Virology did leak covid-19?

[Pohemi]

I was trying to track down which article (out of maybe 8 I've read today) it was in, but there's some speculation that it was not engineered, but discovered in the wild (in China) and brought to the lab for research, where it was leaked by accident.

It's all speculation though, and I'm not sure they'll ever have 100% certainty with China stonewalling the outside world on it.

 

[abj13]

Are you saying there is scientific consensus that SARS-CoV-2 was biological impossible to create in a lab?

The origin of COVID: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box at Wuhan?

Can you show me where I said that? That's pretty unscientific statement. As I've described before, the biological evidence and the logical flow does not support it was created in the lab.

The origin of COVID: Did people or nature open Pandora’s box at Wuhan?

And these pieces are exactly why people think there's evidence of SARS-CoV-2 being created in the lab. They are filled with slick-language and buzz words but seriously take a moment and scrutinize what is claimed in your link. The amount of innuendo and conjecture is quite impressive. And I genuinely mean it, take a moment, and think about what real evidence is provided in that link.

On top of all of that, sadly, that link is outdated, and looks silly in the science that has been published in the following 1.5 years. I actually remember reading that link back in May 2021. Guess what? Many of the key "claims" by the author are simply not supported by real evidence. For example:

"But when you look for the fingerprints of a similar transition in SARS2, a strange surprise awaits. The virus has changed hardly at all, at least until recently. From its very first appearance, it was well adapted to human cells."

This statement is simply wrong. SARS-CoV-2 did not emerge with the D614G mutation, that emerged well after the outbreak in Wuhan. This is a major adaptive mutation for human cells, and it was not present in the initial outbreak. This was well known when he wrote that piece, so clearly he doesn't know SARS-CoV-2 science, or is purposely trying to hide it from the reader. Multiple other mutations have also emerged that clearly demonstrate it was not well adapted for humans including N501Y, K417N/T, L452R, and E484K/Q. Again, the author presumes you'll take his word, but his words disagree with the science at large.

Another example: "Because of all known SARS-related beta-coronaviruses, only SARS2 possesses a furin cleavage site. All the other viruses have their S2 unit cleaved at a different site and by a different mechanism."

Sounds interesting, right? More slick language purposely written to hide inconvenient facts. He purposely writes it this way to try to hide the fact that many other coronaviruses have furin cleavage sites. If he is so knowledgeable about coronaviruses, why would he try to hide this fact?

"There are several curious features about this insert but the oddest is that of the two side-by-side CGG codons. Only 5 percent of SARS2’s arginine codons are CGG, and the double codon CGG-CGG has not been found in any other beta-coronavirus. So how did SARS2 acquire a pair of arginine codons that are favored by human cells but not by coronaviruses?"

CGG-CGG is present in other coronaviruses. Ooops. Why should we trust this author when he purposely tries to manipulate evidence for his purposes? Don't believe me? Here's some of the coronavirus sequence. Search for CGGCGG:

Rousettus bat coronavirus HKU9, complete genome - Nucleotide - NCBI

Infectious bronchitis virus isolate Ind-TN92-03, complete genome - Nucleotide - NCBI

Night-heron coronavirus HKU19, complete genome - Nucleotide - NCBI

Rabbit coronavirus HKU14, complete genome - Nucleotide - NCBI

Lastly, he claims this:
"That leaves a gain-of-function experiment. For those who think SARS2 may have escaped from a lab, explaining the furin cleavage site is no problem at all. “Since 1992 the virology community has known that the one sure way to make a virus deadlier is to give it a furin cleavage site at the S1/S2 junction in the laboratory,” writes Steven Quay, a biotech entrepreneur interested in the origins of SARS2. “At least 11 gain-of-function experiments, adding a furin site to make a virus more infective, are published in the open literature, including [by] Dr. Zhengli Shi, head of coronavirus research at the Wuhan Institute of Virology.”

The furin cleavage site in SARS-CoV-2 is inefficient. If the virus is engineered, why would a group insert a crappy version of the furin-cleavage site into the genome when plenty of other optimal sequences were available? Furthermore, when the virus is grown in culture, the furin cleavage site is lost, found in two different publications. So how would a lab created virus be propagated with the furin form of SARS-CoV-2 when it is eventually lost in cell culture? Sounds like the author didn't really think through his argument, seems like a very common storyline. And that just from four areas I'm willing to take the time and point out his false or purposely manipulative statements.

I'll ask you to go back and review more of his writing. You'll notice it is glaringly lacking in any real evidence. And the few areas he does try to show evidence, it is either purposely distorted, wrong, or illogical.

 

[cytg111]

I was trying to track down which article (out of maybe 8 I've read today) it was in, but there's some speculation that it was not engineered, but discovered in the wild (in China) and brought to the lab for research, where it was leaked by accident.

It's all speculation though, and I'm not sure they'll ever have 100% certainty with China stonewalling the outside world on it.

Damned good speculation though. Without being a statistician, the odds of the only lab in China being *right there* is beyond reasonable doubt that it was somehow involved IMO. Also, with all the science and data available, when the genome experts say this has evolved in the wild and is not lab-work, then there is only so many possible permutations those pieces fit together.

 

[Brovane]

Can you show me where I said that? That's pretty unscientific statement. As I've described before, the biological evidence and the logical flow does not support it was created in the lab.

Is it biologically possible that it could have been created in a lab Yes or No?

 

[HomerJS]

In order to get a definitive answer to lab: yes or no you will need cooperation from China and you are not likely to get it.

Let's be clear, Republicans aren't really interested in the lab question unless they can connect it to gain of function partially funded by any link to Anthony Fauci.

That is their ultimate target.

 

[fskimospy]

In order to get a definitive answer to lab: yes or no you will need cooperation from China and you are not likely to get it.

Let's be clear, Republicans aren't really interested in the lab question unless they can connect it to gain of function partially funded by any link to Anthony Fauci.

That is their ultimate target.

While a definitive answer would be nice of course I think people are willing to settle for a significantly lower standard than that. To this date I have not seen any evidence that I find compelling that supports the lab leak theory other than the location in which it was first detected, and that by itself is…not strong.

 

[Bitek]

Is it biologically possible that it could have been created in a lab Yes or No?

"Created" is a very tall order. Exactly what is meant by this? Engineered from the ground up? The Chinese/Wuhan lab having this technical capability is highly dubious.

Truth is we have been pouring energy into studying all the mutations and their effects, but predictively knowing these and the exact functional reasons behind it is not our capability.

Discovered and inventoried? Believable. A core mission they have.

Studied? If they have it, maybe. Why that one? IDK.

Manipulating the virus? There are tools to do this. But again, why? Not impossible... But plausible? Depends on what we think they were potentially doing.



I still think it's highly suspicious that a novel coronavirus emerged in a Chinese city far from where the natural reservoirs are, but does host a world center of collections of bat coronaviruses. The fact that the Chinese went to immediate cover-up mode only heightens these suspicions.

 

[Bitek]

In order to get a definitive answer to lab: yes or no you will need cooperation from China and you are not likely to get it.

Let's be clear, Republicans aren't really interested in the lab question unless they can connect it to gain of function partially funded by any link to Anthony Fauci.

That is their ultimate target.

Eh, Fauchi sweetens the pot, but there is no love lost for the Chinese communist party stonewalling any investigations.

Flip is back the other way, why be opposed to demanding more answers and reform from the Chinese? Would it be fair to say those that don't want it are just protecting Fauci?

This came from China in every scenario. Either from dangerously run biological labs, or unsanitary and dangerous wildlife meat markets.

7 million people are dead. Trillions of dollars of economic damage. The world deserves answers and change from Chinese.

 

[Pens1566]

"Created" is a very tall order. Exactly what is meant by this? Engineered from the ground up? The Chinese/Wuhan lab having this technical capability is highly dubious.

Truth is we have been pouring energy into studying all the mutations and their effects, but predictively knowing these and the exact functional reasons behind it is not our capability.

Discovered and inventoried? Believable. A core mission they have.

Studied? If they have it, maybe. Why that one? IDK.

Manipulating the virus? There are tools to do this. But again, why? Not impossible... But plausible? Depends on what we think they were potentially doing.



I still think it's highly suspicious that a novel coronavirus emerged in a Chinese city far from where the natural reservoirs are, but does host a world center of collections of bat coronaviruses. The fact that the Chinese went to immediate cover-up mode only heightens these suspicions.

Yeah, it's a very low rhetorical bar that's been set up there.

 

[Brovane]

"Created" is a very tall order. Exactly what is meant by this? Engineered from the ground up? The Chinese/Wuhan lab having this technical capability is highly dubious.

Could "Gain of Function" research been conducted at the Wuhan lab that could have resulted in the SARS-CoV-2?
Could the Wuhan lab have been researching bat coronaviruses gathered from the wild and manipulating them to make human transmission easier?

 

[fskimospy]

Eh, Fauchi sweetens the pot, but there is no love lost for the Chinese communist party stonewalling any investigations.

Flip is back the other way, why be opposed to demanding more answers and reform from the Chinese? Would it be fair to say those that don't want it are just protecting Fauci?

This came from China in every scenario. Either from dangerously run biological labs, or unsanitary and dangerous wildlife meat markets.

7 million people are dead. Trillions of dollars of economic damage. The world deserves answers and change from Chinese.

I don’t know about every scenario but yes it seems like China is by far the most likely source. At a minimum those wet markets are a highly problematic potential source of future pandemics and the world should demand action.

 

[Zorba]

And of course the reaident dumbasses will be by shortly to make sure that somehow it is Bidens fault and that Faucchi is definitely connected to the outbreak.

They of course ignore the fact that had the administration not turned it into a political topic (see Lee country FL for current shenanigans) we would have gotten through this shit a lot faster and nearly a million Americans would still be alive.

And the lab leak hypothesis could've been explored more openly. Part of the problem is republicans we're somehow trying to claim we didn't need to respond because it was a lab leak. The origin of the virus had/has zero impact on how we should've handled the situation.

 

[HomerJS]

Flip is back the other way, why be opposed to demanding more answers and reform from the Chinese? Would it be fair to say those that don't want it are just protecting Fauci?

Protect Fauci from what? Even if it came from a lab there is no evidence Fauci had anything to do with the release.

I'm referring to the M.O. of Republicans. They don't want to fix shit just keep their talking points. Just like they've done for...

abortion
immigration

SCOTUS forced their hand on abortion and now it's dragging them down.

 

[abj13]

Is it biologically possible that it could have been created in a lab Yes or No?

Could "Gain of Function" research been conducted at the Wuhan lab that could have resulted in the SARS-CoV-2?
Could the Wuhan lab have been researching bat coronaviruses gathered from the wild and manipulating them to make human transmission easier?

As pointed out BY (edit) Bitek, you're being somewhat loosy-goosy in your definitions and becoming pedantic.

In order for "gain of function" or "manipulating them" research to result in SARS-CoV-2, you need a starting substrate, aka a backbone virus you plan to manipulate. What is this first virus that they manipulated? The closest known relatives to SARS-CoV-2 is RatG13 and BANAL-52. The nucleotide identity between either genome is 96.1-96.8%. If I only mentioned that value, it would seem they are highly similar, yes? But not in the world of virology. Coronaviruses contain large RNA genomes, so a difference of 3.2-3.9% is huge. To put this another way, out of the ~30,000 nucleotides of SARS-CoV-2, that is ~1,000 nucleotides that are different. How can you purposely or indirectly select 1,000 nucleotides to be different through "gain of function of research?" Please explain the steps, in a clear manner. Don't just handwave, but how could a 1,000 mutations be generated in a rapid timeframe? And if you can, you should publish your results in a top tier scientific journal because such a capacity would take immense number of years and financial backing.

Another way to think about this. XBB1 lineage SARS-CoV-2 only recently emerged. How much do they differ from the original Wuhan strain? They are 99.7% similar, they only differ around ~50 nucleotides with some deletions in the genome. So in nearly 3 years of a pandemic, with a virus that has circulated among millions (maybe >1 billion?) of humans, that has been further selected for by vaccine escape, the virus has only gained about 50 mutations. How is a 1,000 mutations going to be generated?

When scientists talk about "gain of function" research, they do not mean engineering a virus with ~1,000 mutations and hope it works. Now, if there's some other unknown starting virus, please show us how it exists. Second, show us how it was manipulated or mutated through "gain of function" research. Your previous link does not qualify given the already incorrect/false claims about SARS-CoV-2 that I pointed out.

And think about this. If your goal is to purposely cause a pandemic, or to purposely engineer a more severe respiratory virus, why didn't this pandemic occur with a highly mutated strain of SARS-CoV-1 or MERS??? These viruses were discovered 10-20 years ago, with years of research to provide it with "gain of function." So why didn't that happen? Think critically about what you are arguing.

 

[fskimospy]

As pointed out Bitek, you're being somewhat loosy-goosy in your definitions and becoming pedantic.

In order for "gain of function" or "manipulating them" research to result in SARS-CoV-2, you need a starting substrate, aka a backbone virus you plan to manipulate. What is this first virus that they manipulated? The closest known relatives to SARS-CoV-2 is RatG13 and BANAL-52. The nucleotide identity between either genome is 96.1-96.8%. If I only mentioned that value, it would seem they are highly similar, yes? But not in the world of virology. Coronaviruses contain large RNA genomes, so a difference of 3.2-3.9% is huge. To put this another way, out of the ~30,000 nucleotides of SARS-CoV-2, that is ~1,000 nucleotides that are different. How can you purposely or indirectly select 1,000 nucleotides to be different through "gain of function of research?" Please explain the steps, in a clear manner. Don't just handwave, but how could a 1,000 mutations be generated in a rapid timeframe? And if you can, you should publish your results in a top tier scientific journal because such a capacity would take immense number of years and financial backing.

Another way to think about this. XBB1 lineage SARS-CoV-2 only recently emerged. How much do they differ from the original Wuhan strain? They are 99.7% similar, they only differ around ~50 nucleotides with some deletions in the genome. So in nearly 3 years of a pandemic, with a virus that has circulated among millions (maybe >1 billion?) of humans, that has been further selected for by vaccine escape, the virus has only gained about 50 mutations. How is a 1,000 mutations going to be generated?

When scientists talk about "gain of function" research, they do not mean engineering a virus with ~1,000 mutations and hope it works. Now, if there's some other unknown starting virus, please show us how it exists. Second, show us how it was manipulated or mutated through "gain of function" research. Your previous link does not qualify given the already incorrect/false claims about SARS-CoV-2 that I pointed out.

And think about this. If your goal is to purposely cause a pandemic, or to purposely engineer a more severe respiratory virus, why didn't this pandemic occur with a highly mutated strain of SARS-CoV-1 or MERS??? These viruses were discovered 10-20 years ago, with years of research to provide it with "gain of function." So why didn't that happen? Think critically about what you are arguing.

I would also be interested to know what political or strategic purpose would be accomplished by developing a virus like that to release as it would almost certainly come back your way. This is of course one of the primary drawbacks to biological weapons - they are hard to control.

 

[cytg111]

As pointed out Bitek, you're being somewhat loosy-goosy in your definitions and becoming pedantic.

In order for "gain of function" or "manipulating them" research to result in SARS-CoV-2, you need a starting substrate, aka a backbone virus you plan to manipulate. What is this first virus that they manipulated? The closest known relatives to SARS-CoV-2 is RatG13 and BANAL-52. The nucleotide identity between either genome is 96.1-96.8%. If I only mentioned that value, it would seem they are highly similar, yes? But not in the world of virology. Coronaviruses contain large RNA genomes, so a difference of 3.2-3.9% is huge. To put this another way, out of the ~30,000 nucleotides of SARS-CoV-2, that is ~1,000 nucleotides that are different. How can you purposely or indirectly select 1,000 nucleotides to be different through "gain of function of research?" Please explain the steps, in a clear manner. Don't just handwave, but how could a 1,000 mutations be generated in a rapid timeframe? And if you can, you should publish your results in a top tier scientific journal because such a capacity would take immense number of years and financial backing.

Another way to think about this. XBB1 lineage SARS-CoV-2 only recently emerged. How much do they differ from the original Wuhan strain? They are 99.7% similar, they only differ around ~50 nucleotides with some deletions in the genome. So in nearly 3 years of a pandemic, with a virus that has circulated among millions (maybe >1 billion?) of humans, that has been further selected for by vaccine escape, the virus has only gained about 50 mutations. How is a 1,000 mutations going to be generated?

When scientists talk about "gain of function" research, they do not mean engineering a virus with ~1,000 mutations and hope it works. Now, if there's some other unknown starting virus, please show us how it exists. Second, show us how it was manipulated or mutated through "gain of function" research. Your previous link does not qualify given the already incorrect/false claims about SARS-CoV-2 that I pointed out.

And think about this. If your goal is to purposely cause a pandemic, or to purposely engineer a more severe respiratory virus, why didn't this pandemic occur with a highly mutated strain of SARS-CoV-1 or MERS??? These viruses were discovered 10-20 years ago, with years of research to provide it with "gain of function." So why didn't that happen? Think critically about what you are arguing.

100% this, not that I gr0k it, but the science and its wards that I trust tell this story.
On the other hand you have Elon Musk changing his pronouns to Prosecute/Fauci, so who really knows???

(the last part was heavily sarcastic).

 

[Brovane]

As pointed out Bitek, you're being somewhat loosy-goosy in your definitions and becoming pedantic.

In order for "gain of function" or "manipulating them" research to result in SARS-CoV-2, you need a starting substrate, aka a backbone virus you plan to manipulate. What is this first virus that they manipulated? The closest known relatives to SARS-CoV-2 is RatG13 and BANAL-52. The nucleotide identity between either genome is 96.1-96.8%. If I only mentioned that value, it would seem they are highly similar, yes? But not in the world of virology. Coronaviruses contain large RNA genomes, so a difference of 3.2-3.9% is huge. To put this another way, out of the ~30,000 nucleotides of SARS-CoV-2, that is ~1,000 nucleotides that are different. How can you purposely or indirectly select 1,000 nucleotides to be different through "gain of function of research?" Please explain the steps, in a clear manner. Don't just handwave, but how could a 1,000 mutations be generated in a rapid timeframe? And if you can, you should publish your results in a top tier scientific journal because such a capacity would take immense number of years and financial backing.

Another way to think about this. XBB1 lineage SARS-CoV-2 only recently emerged. How much do they differ from the original Wuhan strain? They are 99.7% similar, they only differ around ~50 nucleotides with some deletions in the genome. So in nearly 3 years of a pandemic, with a virus that has circulated among millions (maybe >1 billion?) of humans, that has been further selected for by vaccine escape, the virus has only gained about 50 mutations. How is a 1,000 mutations going to be generated?

When scientists talk about "gain of function" research, they do not mean engineering a virus with ~1,000 mutations and hope it works. Now, if there's some other unknown starting virus, please show us how it exists. Second, show us how it was manipulated or mutated through "gain of function" research. Your previous link does not qualify given the already incorrect/false claims about SARS-CoV-2 that I pointed out.

And think about this. If your goal is to purposely cause a pandemic, or to purposely engineer a more severe respiratory virus, why didn't this pandemic occur with a highly mutated strain of SARS-CoV-1 or MERS??? These viruses were discovered 10-20 years ago, with years of research to provide it with "gain of function." So why didn't that happen? Think critically about what you are arguing.

So you are saying Biological it would be impossible to create SARS-CoV-2 in a lab?

 

[Brovane]

I would also be interested to know what political or strategic purpose would be accomplished by developing a virus like that to release as it would almost certainly come back your way. This is of course one of the primary drawbacks to biological weapons - they are hard to control.

I don't think it was released intentionally by the Chinese, because as you say it would almost certainly come back your way.

 

[Pens1566]

As pointed out Bitek, you're being somewhat loosy-goosy in your definitions and becoming pedantic.

In order for "gain of function" or "manipulating them" research to result in SARS-CoV-2, you need a starting substrate, aka a backbone virus you plan to manipulate. What is this first virus that they manipulated? The closest known relatives to SARS-CoV-2 is RatG13 and BANAL-52. The nucleotide identity between either genome is 96.1-96.8%. If I only mentioned that value, it would seem they are highly similar, yes? But not in the world of virology. Coronaviruses contain large RNA genomes, so a difference of 3.2-3.9% is huge. To put this another way, out of the ~30,000 nucleotides of SARS-CoV-2, that is ~1,000 nucleotides that are different. How can you purposely or indirectly select 1,000 nucleotides to be different through "gain of function of research?" Please explain the steps, in a clear manner. Don't just handwave, but how could a 1,000 mutations be generated in a rapid timeframe? And if you can, you should publish your results in a top tier scientific journal because such a capacity would take immense number of years and financial backing.

Another way to think about this. XBB1 lineage SARS-CoV-2 only recently emerged. How much do they differ from the original Wuhan strain? They are 99.7% similar, they only differ around ~50 nucleotides with some deletions in the genome. So in nearly 3 years of a pandemic, with a virus that has circulated among millions (maybe >1 billion?) of humans, that has been further selected for by vaccine escape, the virus has only gained about 50 mutations. How is a 1,000 mutations going to be generated?

When scientists talk about "gain of function" research, they do not mean engineering a virus with ~1,000 mutations and hope it works. Now, if there's some other unknown starting virus, please show us how it exists. Second, show us how it was manipulated or mutated through "gain of function" research. Your previous link does not qualify given the already incorrect/false claims about SARS-CoV-2 that I pointed out.

And think about this. If your goal is to purposely cause a pandemic, or to purposely engineer a more severe respiratory virus, why didn't this pandemic occur with a highly mutated strain of SARS-CoV-1 or MERS??? These viruses were discovered 10-20 years ago, with years of research to provide it with "gain of function." So why didn't that happen? Think critically about what you are arguing.

For reference, humans and dogs are like 95% genetically similar. So 96.1% ... yeah, you get the point.

 

[Zorba]

Was it a flub or unrealistic expectations of how quickly a brand new vaccine could be rolled out? I am in my 40's and was able to get the first shot of the vaccine by April 21 in CA. My teenage Daughters, were able to get the shot if May of 21. That to me is fairly damn good for a brand new vaccine they had to roll out nationally. Especially when you consider we don't have a nationalized health-care system in the US. I remember when it first rolled out, people were talking late summer of 21 before lower risk people could get the shot.

This is really OT for this thread. But I remember reading a lot at the time about how almost no effort had gone into the planning of the roll out. The administration also highly mislead the states/public on the quantity of shots available. The roll out improved a lot after Biden took over.

That said, the best thing Trump ever did was OWS and he does deserve credit for it. There were a lot of naysayers before and after it was announced.

 

[cytg111]

So you are saying Biological it would be impossible to create SARS-CoV-2 in a lab?

For the Wuhan lab? Yes. That is what he is saying.

 

[[DHT]Osiris]

As pointed out Bitek, you're being somewhat loosy-goosy in your definitions and becoming pedantic.

In order for "gain of function" or "manipulating them" research to result in SARS-CoV-2, you need a starting substrate, aka a backbone virus you plan to manipulate. What is this first virus that they manipulated? The closest known relatives to SARS-CoV-2 is RatG13 and BANAL-52. The nucleotide identity between either genome is 96.1-96.8%. If I only mentioned that value, it would seem they are highly similar, yes? But not in the world of virology. Coronaviruses contain large RNA genomes, so a difference of 3.2-3.9% is huge. To put this another way, out of the ~30,000 nucleotides of SARS-CoV-2, that is ~1,000 nucleotides that are different. How can you purposely or indirectly select 1,000 nucleotides to be different through "gain of function of research?" Please explain the steps, in a clear manner. Don't just handwave, but how could a 1,000 mutations be generated in a rapid timeframe? And if you can, you should publish your results in a top tier scientific journal because such a capacity would take immense number of years and financial backing.

Another way to think about this. XBB1 lineage SARS-CoV-2 only recently emerged. How much do they differ from the original Wuhan strain? They are 99.7% similar, they only differ around ~50 nucleotides with some deletions in the genome. So in nearly 3 years of a pandemic, with a virus that has circulated among millions (maybe >1 billion?) of humans, that has been further selected for by vaccine escape, the virus has only gained about 50 mutations. How is a 1,000 mutations going to be generated?

When scientists talk about "gain of function" research, they do not mean engineering a virus with ~1,000 mutations and hope it works. Now, if there's some other unknown starting virus, please show us how it exists. Second, show us how it was manipulated or mutated through "gain of function" research. Your previous link does not qualify given the already incorrect/false claims about SARS-CoV-2 that I pointed out.

And think about this. If your goal is to purposely cause a pandemic, or to purposely engineer a more severe respiratory virus, why didn't this pandemic occur with a highly mutated strain of SARS-CoV-1 or MERS??? These viruses were discovered 10-20 years ago, with years of research to provide it with "gain of function." So why didn't that happen? Think critically about what you are arguing.

I always found it far more likely that some gain of function research was being done on a multitude of viruses in that lab, and poor quarantining resulted in something escaping and evolving naturally.

Consider that you're also telling us to accept that somewhere around Wuhan was a group of something, probably bats, that was infected with something 99.9% close to the alpha strain of COVID-19, that we didn't know about, and happened to have a breakout in the physical vicinity of that lab. Occam's razor suggests it's far more likely that lab had that virus on-hand from local samples and someone sneezed on a petri dish (I know, not likely a petri dish).

 

[cytg111]

I always found it far more likely that some gain of function research was being done on a multitude of viruses in that lab, and poor quarantining resulted in something escaping and evolving naturally.

Consider that you're also telling us to accept that somewhere around Wuhan was a group of something, probably bats, that was infected with something 99.9% close to the alpha strain of COVID-19, that we didn't know about, and happened to have a breakout in the physical vicinity of that lab. Occam's razor suggests it's far more likely that lab had that virus on-hand from local samples and someone sneezed on a petri dish (I know, not likely a petri dish).

I dont see how the virus couldnt have been collected somewhere else and transported to the Wuhan lab?

 

[Muse]

I dont see how the virus couldnt have been collected somewhere else and transported to the Wuhan lab?

A reasonable hypothesis.

 

[Pens1566]

I dont see how the virus couldnt have been collected somewhere else and transported to the Wuhan lab?

Entirely possible. Still have the issue of absolutely no record of any strain being at all close to the first variants of SARS-Cov2 in the wild though. And, if it was "created" or enhanced at the lab, the time necessary to do so was likely pretty long. Making keeping the existence of the base strain a secret even less likely.