[jakewins]

So what is the probability that a lab that works with HIV normally, now working under extreme pressure, contaminated or mixed up a sample?

And what is the probability that this is not just a third type of major coronavirus, but in fact a secret bioweapon?

Knowing how commonly there are arguments about mixed up samples in the biolabs friends work in, I know where I would place my bets.

[gus_massa]

The article claims that the new coronavirus is an "hybrid" of an usual coronavirus with some parts of HIV. If you mix both virus in a bottle of water, you don't get the hybrid.

If both virus infect a cell simultaneously, there is a small possibility that something like this happens. I think it's so small that is not possible to do it in a laboratory even on purpose, and definitively not by accident but IANAB.

It is easier with other virus. For example mixing variants of flu, because they have (IIRC) 8 strands of DNA. There are avian, swine, human, others flu, and each of them has many subvariants. If some animal get infected with two variants at the same time, a cell may have a double infection and the viral offspring may have a mix.

But the mix is a mix of the strands of DNA, like 3 swine flu + 5 human flu. This is usual, but you must consider that there are millions and millions of animals in the wild and farms. It's more difficult to do it in a small lab, but IANAB.

The main difference is that the article claim that the usual coronavirus and the HIV parts are in a single strain, not a bunch of strains packed together.

[Palptine]

Could easily be "mixed samples" on the other end instead of intentional leaks. You know how old lab equipment could be really useful in a live seafood market.

[xvector]

It would be a pretty lame bioweapon given how few people it’s killed.

[fapjacks]

Be advised that there are many posts on Chinese social media claiming the crematoriums are backlogged with people whose listed cause of death is "viral pneumonia" (or just "pneumonia") because hospitals are turning away so many and diagnostics are not catching up. Do not take statistical reporting for granted: The numbers are a best case scenario of definitive knowns. Also, bioweapons have as diverse a variety of use cases as any other class of weapon: They don't need to kill half of a population to be effective weapons.

[xvector]

While I think China is hiding the number of infected, it'd be pretty hard to hide the proportion of dead to infected as the virus has already escaped Wuhan.

[ngcc_hk]

The question is not hard but no one really know. Would you test a body died recently?

China is not very reliable in gdp (one top guy told us to look at the electricity and we look at pollution). It is very hard to get stat.

So far touch wood no one died outside of China. The death rate should not be high unless the alternative saying hiv death rate after 1 month is 0%.

The conspiracy theory in a proper sense is accidentally leaked for an experiment, like sars virus leaked (later and during study) by Beijing level 3 lab.