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by Gigachad 1629 days ago
If this is all so likely and rapid, why does this not happen constantly every single year? Why did it take so long for one particular virus to leak when it seems like with so many humans we should see some super virus come up constantly.
2 comments
rsynnott 1629 days ago
It does happen from time to time, but it's usually not _quite_ right. In the last couple of decades, there've been at least four or five pandemic false alarms, mostly flu variants. In the event, none of them quite made it. But now that covid _has_ made it, minor variations on the already-very-dangerous-thing can be a big problem.
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trhway 1629 days ago
>Why did it take so long for one particular virus to leak

why long? The EcoAlliance's gain-of-function (with the "Human Subjects Included" checked) NIH grant for Wuhan started in 2014, the human-specific DNA modifications of the virus were described in the EcoAlliance's 2018 DARPA grant proposal, and in the end of 2019 - voila!

With regard to omicron - we may be also witnessing the continuation of the same magic of the fast "gain-of-function" by the virus :

https://www.reuters.com/business/healthcare-pharmaceuticals/...

"By inserting this particular snippet into itself, Omicron might be making itself look "more human," which would help it evade attack by the human immune system, said Venky Soundararajan of Cambridge, Massachusetts-based data analytics firm nference, who led the study posted on Thursday on the website OSF Preprints.

This could mean the virus transmits more easily, while only causing mild or asymptomatic disease."

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xg15 1629 days ago
I guess you're alluding to the "lab leak" theory. I can't say I know how serious it should be taken, but just this: If this really was a lab leak and China knows something we don't know, then I'd be really scared of their current behaviour of locking down entire agglomerations over two-digit numbers of mostly asymptomatic cases.
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bunfunton 1629 days ago
Very serious. Check out this article. Title not representative . Can skip first 10-20% if wanted.

https://www.newsweek.com/how-dr-fauci-other-officials-withhe...

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xg15 1629 days ago
It's a good article, as far as I can tell - in particular as actually presents some evidence for reasonable assumptions. Though to be fair, it was known before that GoF research was conducted in the WIV (I believe) and there is not yet any evidence that the research actually resulted in this virus.

What's new to me though is how deep the involvement of US entities apparently was and how close to SARS-CoV-2 territory the whole endeavour came. So in this case, absence of evidence is definitely not evidence of absence.

Also that one of the drivers of shutting down the lab-leak theory was apparently commissioning the WIV to do GoF research! (Though I still wonder what all the other scientists supporting that editorial were doing.)

If those FOIA papers will be used for more investigations in the near future, thing should definitely become interesting.

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