[jariel]

I share your sentiment, this will be amazing and also a 'working together' time.

But - time - is the issue. It's medical. Stuff takes a long time to develop a test, there are real ethical rules that won't get broken I think even now.

50 years ago, there would be either some brave volunteers who would be willing to get infected or some poor souls somewhere who would be unwittingly infected to see the results. No more of this.

It's possible however the CCP may 'volunteer' some prisoners, or they may allow brave citizen volunteers. I can see that happening. (I can see brave volunteers coming from everywhere, but I don't see governments allowing such a program to go forward).

[dreen]

I dont think thats a problem. At the very least there will be doctors who are infected and there is nothing to prevent them testing the vaccine on themselves.

[jariel]

We need people who do not have the disease to act as guinea pigs for vaccines and other therapies, not just people who already have it.

Also, we need to test drugs and therapies that have excessive, even deadly consequences. Again, dilemma.

This is a huge ethical dilemma.

Up to a generation ago, drug companies would run trials in Africa, away from aggressive regulation.

During the Manhattan project, the US Army would run squads of soldiers right through the aftermath of test nuclear explosions, literally to see 'the effect of radiation'.

Many specialist jobs entailed levels of riks unthinkable today. Remember, this is in an era where cars didn't have seat-belts.

In 2020, things have changed, but it's possible totalitarian regimes will find 'volunteers'.

China has been engaging in harvesting the organs of political prisoners, at scale [1]. If they're willing to put people in prison for their ethnicity, and then 'have them die' so that a rich person can get a kidney through back channels ... then absolutely they can do medical trials on these people, it may not even need to be publicized.

[1] https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/china-credibly-accused...

[gdy]

I love that the 'tribunal' starts its conclusion with 'If the accusations are true'.

They can be true, but remember the Curveball dossier that helped to start a war.

In a February 2011 interview with The Guardian he [Rafid al-Janabi] "admitted for the first time that he lied about his story, then watched in shock as it was used to justify the war."

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Curveball_(informant)

[dreen]

I'm aware of all that stuff, I was just saying there is no ethical dillema or procedure if you want to do medical tests on yourself. That's how Barry Marshall proved that Helicobacter pylori causes stomach ulcers.