Thank you very much for an excellent essay - you explained it so well that even me, a layperson can understand it. Loved the pasta analogy. Your writing style held my interest throughout. I've subscribed and look forward to reading more....
Whether it was accident, on purpose, or natural, I hope that Omicron marks the end of this pandemic. All the narrative for vaccine passports no longer holds water. Let's start living life again!
Thank you, Prana, for stopping by, for taking the time to read, and for sharing your kind comments! I hope 2022 is a better year for all of humanity. Until we put a stop to this research (again) I won’t be resting very easy.
1) any chance you could find someone to steelman those who'd explain it away?
2) omicron seems like a gift to the (western) world, especially the blue anon crazies, who did all the things but're still getting sick but not severely. Thoughts?
Not sure I'm ready to think on how to stop doing GOFR in the age of crispr
Ah yes CRISPR. There are a lot of ethical problems with that too. And I see what you’re saying. But not all genetic modifications involve making super-viruses that can wipe out humankind. Baby steps!
As for steelmanning a natural origin, I’d love to find someone. Even Alina Chan, who I find very believable, seems to think omicron is natural but I’m not seeing much evidence of it. I’ll go find what she said and paste it below…
"This is Alina Chan, one of the co-authors of Viral: The Search for the Origin of Covid-19.
"In defense of a natural origin of Omicron, this study describes the remarkable evolution of SARS-CoV-2 during convalescent plasma treatment of an immunosuppressed patient for 3-4 months; the mutations also reduced sensitivity to neutralizing antibodies: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03291-y
"We know that there is a large immunocompromised population in Africa and that Covid-19 is rampant there. We also know that most hospitals, regardless of country, don't have the resources to track the evolution of SARS-CoV-2 in their immunocompromised patients. So it's not unexpected that a variant like Omicron could have evolved over an entire year in an immunocompromised individual before finally infecting others.
"If there is any evidence that a lab in the region was serially passaging SARS-CoV-2 in neutralizing antibodies/patient serum, then I'd say there is something to go on for a potential lab origin. But at the moment, there is not even circumstantial evidence pointing to this happening in Africa. Maybe setting up a secure channel for whistleblowers with evidence of the above would be the most productive approach.
"The above is not to say that I don't think there needs to be much more transparency and accountability from scientists working with pathogens."
That's her best case for it. The Nature article she mentions says, basically "These data reveal strong selection on SARS-CoV-2 during convalescent plasma therapy, which is associated with the emergence of viral variants that show evidence of reduced susceptibility to neutralizing antibodies in immunosuppressed individuals."
Yes, if you give an immune compromised person neutralizing antibodies, that person might end up with some mutated virus that is resistant to existing antibodies. Fair enough. That explains one of the four weirdnesses, and leaves three unexplained. So I find it not a compelling hypothesis.
Also, she says "it's not unexpected that a variant like Omicron could have evolved over an entire year in an immunocompromised individual before finally infecting others." -- how is this "not unexpected"? Is the person in the middle of nowhere, in a cave? Sick but not getting treatments? Not coming into contact with anyone else? Because this is such a transmissible virus it's infected the entire world in a month. So is the person in isolation somewhere, for a year, not in contact with other humans? Well no, they can't be in isolation from other humans -- they're getting fancy treatments in this hypothesis, which prompts the antibody-resistant SARS, so they're being followed medically. But not infecting a single other person. It seems very "unexpected indeed." It doesn't seem to hang together.
Great beginning on Substack! Your rightful emphasis on the importance of the orgin caught my attention. I share that view. Have read the detailed scientific publications over the past year, many of which you've sourced, leads to a startling (yet unsurprising) conclusion- it's difficult to deny this thing started in the lab. And that causes cognitive dissonance
It also pulls the Jenga piece that starts the collapse of this canard some still call free governance. It means OUR government, benevolent as it is, funded research that resulted in the largest man-made catastrophe ever witnessed. It lied about it. It aggressively attacked "dissenting" opinions that happened to coincide with the most likely scenario. It labeled any unapproved treatment options as dangerous, born of wild conspiracy theories. It mandated a vaccine that our betters declared untrustworthy a year ago. It required face coverings with openings many times larger in size than the virus, after initially stating they didn't work. Finally, putting whip cream on this pile of dog shit, it covered the whole thing up and demonized anyone smart enough to say, "excuse me?"
I get it. People want to move on. But how is something of this magnitude NOT the most important issue we face? For if we find our republic complicant in this disaster, is it not time to finally demand accountability for those responsible?
Thanks very much, JD. I agree it’s all very disturbing. The most distressing part is that millions of people are dead, millions more could die, and this issue is not being discussed seriously at all. It’s all under the rug. So what’s to stop this from happening again and again?
Exactly. It likely has happened again and again, minus the horrible consequences and our knowledge. Which is why, to me, the biggest failure of all lies with corporate media. The metamorphosis from the people's representative to the the state's enables and encourages precisely these situations. It could not happen without media compliance, ne, advocacy. Other institutions ruled by our illustrious establishment share blame, but they too benefit from opacity. Ironically, COVID provided a small glimpse into one of them- the educational system- via remote learning (an oxymoron for the ages). Virginia quickly found its middle finger
Arguements re CRT, while fruitful, still miss the bigger picture. How did it enter the school system virtually unseen in the first place? Nonetheless, it stuck because it affected people directly. Same with covid. Imagine the panic if a pandemic that killed millions gets linked to a seemingly unimportant, small potatoes government grant. (Any private citizen or organization would already find their head on a post). Just think of all the programs like the covid grant, designed by these accountability-free geniuses, that we fund but cannot see. Does our media clean the window? No. They board it up and write graffiti over the top
Owning a company, I self-censor constantly for fear of saying anything controversial that harms our enterprise in some way. By this I mean expressions so benign that five years ago they could have qualified as Xanax in ink. Thank goodness for substack and forums like it. Driven by anger over my own self-cencorship behaviors, I've been reading, learning and writing ferociously over the past few months. The thoughtful comments to well written articles such as this prove I'm not alone. As yet I do not have a landing spot to publish what I've done. Substacks like yours, 21, inspire me. They really do. My missives aren't as well researched or written as what you've done here. Congratulations! Energy for me comes from merely committing thoughts to written word. I don't care so much how it's received. I am, however, sick of voluntarily receding from the battle. Whatever form that takes, I'm in. The stakes are too high to ignore. The situation demands we reenter the field of play. This must not continue!
Thank you so much, JD, for your inspiring (and generous) comments! I hope you decide to publish your work. Substack has been very easy to use. I like it a lot.
"Just think of all the programs like the covid grant, designed by these accountability-free geniuses, that we fund but cannot see. Does our media clean the window? No. They board it up and write graffiti over the top."
This sums up a huge part of the problem, quite nicely.
A lot of people have written on the role of media. Fewer and fewer, richer and richer entities control the mainstream media. The people who work in mainstream media are not interested in finding and publishing truth or acting in the public interest. Like any of us, the people who have those jobs are interested in keeping their jobs and their health insurance (so, just like us, they self-censor). They are interested in "access" -- for example, if you were a journalist covering a presidential press conference and you asked a pointed question, or wrote something true but not part of the preferred "narrative" you would soon find that you lose your access.
It's a mess.
I love alternative sources of information, but I think it's a lot of work for the public to discern who's credible and who's not. So that presents its own set of problems.
Good luck and let me know if you set up an account somewhere to post your articles. :)
Right on. Yes, alternative information presents its own problems. At the very least, it squelches arbitration of ideas. That's the first step towards fixing this mess. And as much as I've always been a government skeptic, I never envisioned having to write that
You have very eloquently expressed what I hope more and more of us are thinking.
And yes, self-censorship is very real. Who would have believed the U.S. could come to a point where people hesitate (or even fear) to express their opinions? And that there would be a large group actively advocating for suppression of speech? Unthinkable only a few years ago.
Thank you! The speed at which thoughtful opinions became wrong-speech caught normals off guard. One day you write a benign tweet, the next day, banished. Or mobbed for an offhand comment written ages ago. May we trust in the feisty
A really informative and thought-provoking article; thank you.
A little historical perpective: Many of us are familiar with Eisenhower's warning about the dangers of the power of the military-industrial complex in his 1960 farewell address. The next section of that speech warned of the danger of a scientific-technological elite with too much power:
"Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.
In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly... the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity...
The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded.
Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite."
Thank you Heyjude. I couldn’t agree more. When I first heard about this speech as a kid, our teacher said it was really startling and remarkable that Eisenhower used his brief farewell address to warn everyone of these dangers.
"But a highly transmissible virus is still going to find its way out of a lab on a regular basis. It’s dangerous to mess with it. For example, we know that the delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 leaked out of a lab in Taiwan in late 2021."
Yes, I meant delta. The Taiwan lab was doing some work with delta. Note I'm not saying (as some have misinterpreted, so I think I worded it poorly) that delta itself originated in a lab leak. I'm saying that viruses leak from labs frequently, and we know about the incident in Taiwan, because they were honest and proactive about it.
It´s unbelievable that something such as GOF exists, a shame to all of us. The potential danger of it is unpredictable and these practices should be banned imediately. Thanks for share all these valuable info to public domain at these brilliant article.
Thank you very much for reading and commenting, Francisco. I agree this research is extremely dangerous, the consequences of accidents are unpredictable and potentially enormous, and the research should be banned.
I've tried contacting my congresspeople. No response (yet) although all they ever do is send boilerplate thanking me for my opinions. I've tried reaching out to Marc Lipsitch, who was heavily involved in Cambridge Working Group before. No response.
I must admit: I'm really stumped as to why we have not heard more of an outcry from all the scientists who were involved in 2014 getting it put on hold before. If you go to the original CWG page http://www.cambridgeworkinggroup.org/ you'll see the long list of scientists who were involved just 7, 8 years ago. If you scan the list and know any of those people, I'd suggest reaching out to them.
If any of those people have open DMs on Twitter (and are active there) maybe you can get a reply. When I have more time, I might try this too -- working the list.
I wonder what Alina Chan (author of Viral thinks). Maybe will try to reach out to her. She replied (in a negative way!) on my posts about the possible lab leak 2.0.
I think really what we need to do -- as much as we can -- is to let people know the seriousness of this problem and start the conversations. The _more_ this gets talked about, the more it is likely to get attention.
Another idea (maybe I'll try this -- you can too) is to write to Steven Salzberg who wrote that Forbes piece expressing how dangerous it was to reverse the decision in 2017. Maybe he could be made interested in writing about it again.
I think the first step is just to _talk_ about it, and to reach out to people who we know were interested in the issue and had influence before, and apply as much friendly pressure as we can.
This is something I would definitely go protest about in person, if we had a critical mass of people. Sometimes when I think of all the people who went to protest the vaccine (based on Robert Malone's misrepresentations) I think, "WOW -- these people were all in DC, they could have done something worthwhile, and instead they were fooled by this con man."
Sometimes -- when I'm in a paranoid mood -- I think people high up in government create these distractions so we won't protest things that actually matter. Like this.
BTW (as I commented on twitter) your definition of GoF will meet resistance. "Put in the simplest terms, GoF is research that attempts to take existing pathogens, such as viruses, and make them more dangerous to humans." Prof Peter Doherty (Nobel Laureate in immunology), for example, states that the yellow fever and MMR vaccines are examples of GoF. You can listen to the interview and read the transcript at https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/healthreport/the-origins-of-sars-cov-2/13441308
I think the problem is "dangerous" GoF. How that can be defined is, of course, contested.
Thank you! I'll check that out -- I had heard that definition and had the impression (?) it was essentially a PR attempt to "rehabilitate" GoF by expanding its definition. Any attenuated virus might be best categorized as a LoF ("loss of function") experiment! :) I think what the Cambridge Working Group was against was GoF as understood to be "the dangerous kind": The making of more dangerous pathogens.
It may not always be the case to modify these pathogens to produce more dangerous variants. Scientists also attempt GoF work to modify pathogens that are difficult to model. GoF work can be justified (in their mind) as a way to modify the pathogen to fit their model (cells in culture, mice, pigs, etc). Serial passage through human cells is one of doing this. Very dangerous and short sighted in my opinion. Nice article.
Need an audience? Tweet at Breaking Points' Saagar Enjeti or if that doesn't work the The Hill's Rising hosts (Robbie, Ryan, Kim). Saagar has been banging the "GoF bad" drum for a while and would love this story.
Thanks for the links. I can see why the guy in the zerohedge article who called it early would be frustrated. Only now with the emails (and the DARPA application etc) are more people starting to come around to the idea that this was an enormous coverup and scientists who should have (and did) know better about the obvious origin of the virus lied to everyone’s face.
Re the second link, also interesting. I’ve been thinking of doing something similar (the four sided coin, trying to give people a sense for how unlikely it is) but there are so many other factors than just the sequence so… I’m not sure it makes sense to attempt it. Still might.
Where is the lab where Omikron escaped from? In Wuhan the first cases happened in the city with two biolabs doing research in corona viruses. But where in South Africa could Omikron have been created? I think a discussion about that issue is really missing in this article.
It is really missing. I agree. As I mentioned at the beginning, this is very early in this virus’s history. There’s a lot we don’t know and a lot we have left to learn.
There were, by the way, some posts (possibly by Yuri Deigin?) claiming that some similar research was happening in Durban, South Africa, but I wasn’t really sure how to confirm or disconfirm that yet, so I left it out.
My only point is this:
Neither of two weak hypotheses offered by the mainstream (an immune compromised person or a wild mouse) fits the four weirdnesses described.
What _does_ fit the four weirdnesses described? A virus that has been manipulated (in ways that we already know scientists manipulate viruses).
And if the virus was manipulated, the two ways it got out of a lab were either a lab leak or an intentional release. I would think an accident, not intention, is more likely.
So, among the hypotheses on currently on offer, only a manipulated virus fits the data. The mainstream hypotheses don’t come close to fitting the data.
Am I saying “It’s a leak for sure?” No. Neither you nor I know that.
But I am saying it fits the information we have.
My other point of course is that if a dangerous virus leaked out of a lab multiple times over the last couple years, we need to take a hard look at whether this type of research benefits or harms humankind. We need to decide whether to allow it, restrict it, or end it.
The more we avoid the topic and assume it came from nature when the virus’s weirdnesses don’t fit that hypothesis, the more we increase the danger to humankind, because this type of research and its dangers are not being discussed.
This is an incredibly important discussion to have.
Thank you for the article, and for encouraging me to continue to keep reading when I was thinking you were a CRAZY conspiracy theorist. (I, myself, am a conspiracy theorist, but one who only has time for the actual conspiracies! But I digress.)
I may have not picked up on this in your piece but do you think the GoF enthusiasts actually believe that they are doing this for the reasons they give, or do you think they are doing it to develop biological weapons?
Thank you so much for reading, Paul! Well, the true answer is "I don't know." I really don't. To me, it seems sensible to think that some of this research could be used for bioweapons.
I wish I could give credit to the person who came up with this, but I forget who it was (and I'm paraphrasing): To study one altered virus and think you can predict a future pandemic is like trying to predict the climate from one raindrop.
I don't think the stated purpose of GoF makes a lot of sense, although I don't know, and it could be exactly as people say it is.
But to me, the most important point is that it's incredibly dangerous. This how disruptive the last two years have been, even for people who didn't get sick. This has been terrible, and this virus was even "that bad" in the big scheme of things.
Is it possible that endeavours that most would classify as "good," genetic experiments involving vectors to insert genetic material with good aims- cancer therapies, transplant medicine could be responsible, do you think?
I don't know -- I've gotten the impression that "the good stuff" could be gotten by other safer means. (Read for example the linked Forbes article? I think that one addresses that.)
Thank you very much for this essay. I think you raise some valid points. However, I was wondering how would you explain the BA.2 and BA.3 variants within this hypothesis?
So these are subvariants, meaning they evolved/mutated after omicron was already out in the world, and they seem to be doing what subvariants would normally do. I don't think they can speak (much) to the origin, except. for example, it would be interesting to look and see what types of new mutations they are developing, and for example whether those new mutations arise in a more normal ratio.
A very easy-to-read article that doesn’t skip the tough bits. Extremely worth the time for a better understanding of what happens in the world of microbiology, and what’s happening right now.
Thank you very much for an excellent essay - you explained it so well that even me, a layperson can understand it. Loved the pasta analogy. Your writing style held my interest throughout. I've subscribed and look forward to reading more....
Whether it was accident, on purpose, or natural, I hope that Omicron marks the end of this pandemic. All the narrative for vaccine passports no longer holds water. Let's start living life again!
Thank you, Prana, for stopping by, for taking the time to read, and for sharing your kind comments! I hope 2022 is a better year for all of humanity. Until we put a stop to this research (again) I won’t be resting very easy.
Thank you. This really filled some gaps in my understanding of what ethical skeptic has been saying.
Great explainer.
1) any chance you could find someone to steelman those who'd explain it away?
2) omicron seems like a gift to the (western) world, especially the blue anon crazies, who did all the things but're still getting sick but not severely. Thoughts?
Not sure I'm ready to think on how to stop doing GOFR in the age of crispr
Ah yes CRISPR. There are a lot of ethical problems with that too. And I see what you’re saying. But not all genetic modifications involve making super-viruses that can wipe out humankind. Baby steps!
As for steelmanning a natural origin, I’d love to find someone. Even Alina Chan, who I find very believable, seems to think omicron is natural but I’m not seeing much evidence of it. I’ll go find what she said and paste it below…
OK here we go. Over at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=29788869 there are people critiquing it. Someone who says she's Alina had this to say:
"This is Alina Chan, one of the co-authors of Viral: The Search for the Origin of Covid-19.
"In defense of a natural origin of Omicron, this study describes the remarkable evolution of SARS-CoV-2 during convalescent plasma treatment of an immunosuppressed patient for 3-4 months; the mutations also reduced sensitivity to neutralizing antibodies: https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03291-y
"We know that there is a large immunocompromised population in Africa and that Covid-19 is rampant there. We also know that most hospitals, regardless of country, don't have the resources to track the evolution of SARS-CoV-2 in their immunocompromised patients. So it's not unexpected that a variant like Omicron could have evolved over an entire year in an immunocompromised individual before finally infecting others.
"If there is any evidence that a lab in the region was serially passaging SARS-CoV-2 in neutralizing antibodies/patient serum, then I'd say there is something to go on for a potential lab origin. But at the moment, there is not even circumstantial evidence pointing to this happening in Africa. Maybe setting up a secure channel for whistleblowers with evidence of the above would be the most productive approach.
"The above is not to say that I don't think there needs to be much more transparency and accountability from scientists working with pathogens."
That's her best case for it. The Nature article she mentions says, basically "These data reveal strong selection on SARS-CoV-2 during convalescent plasma therapy, which is associated with the emergence of viral variants that show evidence of reduced susceptibility to neutralizing antibodies in immunosuppressed individuals."
Yes, if you give an immune compromised person neutralizing antibodies, that person might end up with some mutated virus that is resistant to existing antibodies. Fair enough. That explains one of the four weirdnesses, and leaves three unexplained. So I find it not a compelling hypothesis.
Also, she says "it's not unexpected that a variant like Omicron could have evolved over an entire year in an immunocompromised individual before finally infecting others." -- how is this "not unexpected"? Is the person in the middle of nowhere, in a cave? Sick but not getting treatments? Not coming into contact with anyone else? Because this is such a transmissible virus it's infected the entire world in a month. So is the person in isolation somewhere, for a year, not in contact with other humans? Well no, they can't be in isolation from other humans -- they're getting fancy treatments in this hypothesis, which prompts the antibody-resistant SARS, so they're being followed medically. But not infecting a single other person. It seems very "unexpected indeed." It doesn't seem to hang together.
Great beginning on Substack! Your rightful emphasis on the importance of the orgin caught my attention. I share that view. Have read the detailed scientific publications over the past year, many of which you've sourced, leads to a startling (yet unsurprising) conclusion- it's difficult to deny this thing started in the lab. And that causes cognitive dissonance
It also pulls the Jenga piece that starts the collapse of this canard some still call free governance. It means OUR government, benevolent as it is, funded research that resulted in the largest man-made catastrophe ever witnessed. It lied about it. It aggressively attacked "dissenting" opinions that happened to coincide with the most likely scenario. It labeled any unapproved treatment options as dangerous, born of wild conspiracy theories. It mandated a vaccine that our betters declared untrustworthy a year ago. It required face coverings with openings many times larger in size than the virus, after initially stating they didn't work. Finally, putting whip cream on this pile of dog shit, it covered the whole thing up and demonized anyone smart enough to say, "excuse me?"
I get it. People want to move on. But how is something of this magnitude NOT the most important issue we face? For if we find our republic complicant in this disaster, is it not time to finally demand accountability for those responsible?
Thanks very much, JD. I agree it’s all very disturbing. The most distressing part is that millions of people are dead, millions more could die, and this issue is not being discussed seriously at all. It’s all under the rug. So what’s to stop this from happening again and again?
Exactly. It likely has happened again and again, minus the horrible consequences and our knowledge. Which is why, to me, the biggest failure of all lies with corporate media. The metamorphosis from the people's representative to the the state's enables and encourages precisely these situations. It could not happen without media compliance, ne, advocacy. Other institutions ruled by our illustrious establishment share blame, but they too benefit from opacity. Ironically, COVID provided a small glimpse into one of them- the educational system- via remote learning (an oxymoron for the ages). Virginia quickly found its middle finger
Arguements re CRT, while fruitful, still miss the bigger picture. How did it enter the school system virtually unseen in the first place? Nonetheless, it stuck because it affected people directly. Same with covid. Imagine the panic if a pandemic that killed millions gets linked to a seemingly unimportant, small potatoes government grant. (Any private citizen or organization would already find their head on a post). Just think of all the programs like the covid grant, designed by these accountability-free geniuses, that we fund but cannot see. Does our media clean the window? No. They board it up and write graffiti over the top
Owning a company, I self-censor constantly for fear of saying anything controversial that harms our enterprise in some way. By this I mean expressions so benign that five years ago they could have qualified as Xanax in ink. Thank goodness for substack and forums like it. Driven by anger over my own self-cencorship behaviors, I've been reading, learning and writing ferociously over the past few months. The thoughtful comments to well written articles such as this prove I'm not alone. As yet I do not have a landing spot to publish what I've done. Substacks like yours, 21, inspire me. They really do. My missives aren't as well researched or written as what you've done here. Congratulations! Energy for me comes from merely committing thoughts to written word. I don't care so much how it's received. I am, however, sick of voluntarily receding from the battle. Whatever form that takes, I'm in. The stakes are too high to ignore. The situation demands we reenter the field of play. This must not continue!
Thank you so much, JD, for your inspiring (and generous) comments! I hope you decide to publish your work. Substack has been very easy to use. I like it a lot.
"Just think of all the programs like the covid grant, designed by these accountability-free geniuses, that we fund but cannot see. Does our media clean the window? No. They board it up and write graffiti over the top."
This sums up a huge part of the problem, quite nicely.
A lot of people have written on the role of media. Fewer and fewer, richer and richer entities control the mainstream media. The people who work in mainstream media are not interested in finding and publishing truth or acting in the public interest. Like any of us, the people who have those jobs are interested in keeping their jobs and their health insurance (so, just like us, they self-censor). They are interested in "access" -- for example, if you were a journalist covering a presidential press conference and you asked a pointed question, or wrote something true but not part of the preferred "narrative" you would soon find that you lose your access.
It's a mess.
I love alternative sources of information, but I think it's a lot of work for the public to discern who's credible and who's not. So that presents its own set of problems.
Good luck and let me know if you set up an account somewhere to post your articles. :)
Right on. Yes, alternative information presents its own problems. At the very least, it squelches arbitration of ideas. That's the first step towards fixing this mess. And as much as I've always been a government skeptic, I never envisioned having to write that
You have very eloquently expressed what I hope more and more of us are thinking.
And yes, self-censorship is very real. Who would have believed the U.S. could come to a point where people hesitate (or even fear) to express their opinions? And that there would be a large group actively advocating for suppression of speech? Unthinkable only a few years ago.
Thank you! The speed at which thoughtful opinions became wrong-speech caught normals off guard. One day you write a benign tweet, the next day, banished. Or mobbed for an offhand comment written ages ago. May we trust in the feisty
A really informative and thought-provoking article; thank you.
A little historical perpective: Many of us are familiar with Eisenhower's warning about the dangers of the power of the military-industrial complex in his 1960 farewell address. The next section of that speech warned of the danger of a scientific-technological elite with too much power:
"Akin to, and largely responsible for the sweeping changes in our industrial-military posture, has been the technological revolution during recent decades.
In this revolution, research has become central; it also becomes more formalized, complex, and costly... the free university, historically the fountainhead of free ideas and scientific discovery, has experienced a revolution in the conduct of research. Partly because of the huge costs involved, a government contract becomes virtually a substitute for intellectual curiosity...
The prospect of domination of the nation's scholars by Federal employment, project allocations, and the power of money is ever present and is gravely to be regarded.
Yet, in holding scientific research and discovery in respect, as we should, we must also be alert to the equal and opposite danger that public policy could itself become the captive of a scientific-technological elite."
We should have paid more attention on all counts.
Thank you Heyjude. I couldn’t agree more. When I first heard about this speech as a kid, our teacher said it was really startling and remarkable that Eisenhower used his brief farewell address to warn everyone of these dangers.
Was he ever right.
"But a highly transmissible virus is still going to find its way out of a lab on a regular basis. It’s dangerous to mess with it. For example, we know that the delta variant of SARS-CoV-2 leaked out of a lab in Taiwan in late 2021."
Did you mean omicron variant here?
Yes, I meant delta. The Taiwan lab was doing some work with delta. Note I'm not saying (as some have misinterpreted, so I think I worded it poorly) that delta itself originated in a lab leak. I'm saying that viruses leak from labs frequently, and we know about the incident in Taiwan, because they were honest and proactive about it.
Thank you for the clarification.
The referenced articles explicitly mention that Delta variant was leaked.
It´s unbelievable that something such as GOF exists, a shame to all of us. The potential danger of it is unpredictable and these practices should be banned imediately. Thanks for share all these valuable info to public domain at these brilliant article.
Thank you very much for reading and commenting, Francisco. I agree this research is extremely dangerous, the consequences of accidents are unpredictable and potentially enormous, and the research should be banned.
I've tried contacting my congresspeople. No response (yet) although all they ever do is send boilerplate thanking me for my opinions. I've tried reaching out to Marc Lipsitch, who was heavily involved in Cambridge Working Group before. No response.
I must admit: I'm really stumped as to why we have not heard more of an outcry from all the scientists who were involved in 2014 getting it put on hold before. If you go to the original CWG page http://www.cambridgeworkinggroup.org/ you'll see the long list of scientists who were involved just 7, 8 years ago. If you scan the list and know any of those people, I'd suggest reaching out to them.
If any of those people have open DMs on Twitter (and are active there) maybe you can get a reply. When I have more time, I might try this too -- working the list.
I wonder what Alina Chan (author of Viral thinks). Maybe will try to reach out to her. She replied (in a negative way!) on my posts about the possible lab leak 2.0.
I think really what we need to do -- as much as we can -- is to let people know the seriousness of this problem and start the conversations. The _more_ this gets talked about, the more it is likely to get attention.
Another idea (maybe I'll try this -- you can too) is to write to Steven Salzberg who wrote that Forbes piece expressing how dangerous it was to reverse the decision in 2017. Maybe he could be made interested in writing about it again.
I think the first step is just to _talk_ about it, and to reach out to people who we know were interested in the issue and had influence before, and apply as much friendly pressure as we can.
This is something I would definitely go protest about in person, if we had a critical mass of people. Sometimes when I think of all the people who went to protest the vaccine (based on Robert Malone's misrepresentations) I think, "WOW -- these people were all in DC, they could have done something worthwhile, and instead they were fooled by this con man."
Sometimes -- when I'm in a paranoid mood -- I think people high up in government create these distractions so we won't protest things that actually matter. Like this.
I'm so glad you're interested in this issue!!!
TheSalonniere at protonmail dotcom
BTW (as I commented on twitter) your definition of GoF will meet resistance. "Put in the simplest terms, GoF is research that attempts to take existing pathogens, such as viruses, and make them more dangerous to humans." Prof Peter Doherty (Nobel Laureate in immunology), for example, states that the yellow fever and MMR vaccines are examples of GoF. You can listen to the interview and read the transcript at https://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/healthreport/the-origins-of-sars-cov-2/13441308
I think the problem is "dangerous" GoF. How that can be defined is, of course, contested.
Thank you! I'll check that out -- I had heard that definition and had the impression (?) it was essentially a PR attempt to "rehabilitate" GoF by expanding its definition. Any attenuated virus might be best categorized as a LoF ("loss of function") experiment! :) I think what the Cambridge Working Group was against was GoF as understood to be "the dangerous kind": The making of more dangerous pathogens.
It may not always be the case to modify these pathogens to produce more dangerous variants. Scientists also attempt GoF work to modify pathogens that are difficult to model. GoF work can be justified (in their mind) as a way to modify the pathogen to fit their model (cells in culture, mice, pigs, etc). Serial passage through human cells is one of doing this. Very dangerous and short sighted in my opinion. Nice article.
Thank you very much for taking the time to read and comment. I agree it’s dangerous and short sighted.
I'm partial to the idea that Omicron was accidentally created by Merck while testing their mutation-causing covid drug in South Africa: https://twitter.com/ydeigin/status/1474116195444006922
There are so many possibilities, none of which we know yet -- but that's interesting to think about. And Yuri posts many reasonable things.
Need an audience? Tweet at Breaking Points' Saagar Enjeti or if that doesn't work the The Hill's Rising hosts (Robbie, Ryan, Kim). Saagar has been banging the "GoF bad" drum for a while and would love this story.
Thanks for the tip! :)
Here is another angle #1:
https://www.zerohedge.com/covid-19/covid-lab-leak-whitewash-has-been-death-science-says-professor-who-found-unique "But it was highly unusual to find so many positive charges in a row because they also repel each other, he said.
“We realised when they released the sequence of the virus it broke the laws of physics for a natural virus meaning it was genetically modified. "
#2 angle:
https://thetruthiswhere.wordpress.com/2022/01/17/moderna-patented-man-made-sars-cov2-gene-sequence-in-2018/
"SARS-CoV-2 genome contains a 19 nucleotide sequence #CTCCTCGGCGGGCACGTAG
Probability of sequence occurring by chance: less than 1 in a billion.
There’s no known virus including this sequence prior to SARS-Cov-2."
Where author of #2 article is not aware of article#, since it is not so "random" affinity, and charges dictate probability!
And then your article!
Now you have more to make new information fusion for updated article!
Thanks for the links. I can see why the guy in the zerohedge article who called it early would be frustrated. Only now with the emails (and the DARPA application etc) are more people starting to come around to the idea that this was an enormous coverup and scientists who should have (and did) know better about the obvious origin of the virus lied to everyone’s face.
Re the second link, also interesting. I’ve been thinking of doing something similar (the four sided coin, trying to give people a sense for how unlikely it is) but there are so many other factors than just the sequence so… I’m not sure it makes sense to attempt it. Still might.
Thanks!
Where is the lab where Omikron escaped from? In Wuhan the first cases happened in the city with two biolabs doing research in corona viruses. But where in South Africa could Omikron have been created? I think a discussion about that issue is really missing in this article.
It is really missing. I agree. As I mentioned at the beginning, this is very early in this virus’s history. There’s a lot we don’t know and a lot we have left to learn.
There were, by the way, some posts (possibly by Yuri Deigin?) claiming that some similar research was happening in Durban, South Africa, but I wasn’t really sure how to confirm or disconfirm that yet, so I left it out.
My only point is this:
Neither of two weak hypotheses offered by the mainstream (an immune compromised person or a wild mouse) fits the four weirdnesses described.
What _does_ fit the four weirdnesses described? A virus that has been manipulated (in ways that we already know scientists manipulate viruses).
And if the virus was manipulated, the two ways it got out of a lab were either a lab leak or an intentional release. I would think an accident, not intention, is more likely.
So, among the hypotheses on currently on offer, only a manipulated virus fits the data. The mainstream hypotheses don’t come close to fitting the data.
Am I saying “It’s a leak for sure?” No. Neither you nor I know that.
But I am saying it fits the information we have.
My other point of course is that if a dangerous virus leaked out of a lab multiple times over the last couple years, we need to take a hard look at whether this type of research benefits or harms humankind. We need to decide whether to allow it, restrict it, or end it.
The more we avoid the topic and assume it came from nature when the virus’s weirdnesses don’t fit that hypothesis, the more we increase the danger to humankind, because this type of research and its dangers are not being discussed.
This is an incredibly important discussion to have.
Thank you for the article, and for encouraging me to continue to keep reading when I was thinking you were a CRAZY conspiracy theorist. (I, myself, am a conspiracy theorist, but one who only has time for the actual conspiracies! But I digress.)
I may have not picked up on this in your piece but do you think the GoF enthusiasts actually believe that they are doing this for the reasons they give, or do you think they are doing it to develop biological weapons?
Thank you.
Thank you so much for reading, Paul! Well, the true answer is "I don't know." I really don't. To me, it seems sensible to think that some of this research could be used for bioweapons.
I wish I could give credit to the person who came up with this, but I forget who it was (and I'm paraphrasing): To study one altered virus and think you can predict a future pandemic is like trying to predict the climate from one raindrop.
I don't think the stated purpose of GoF makes a lot of sense, although I don't know, and it could be exactly as people say it is.
But to me, the most important point is that it's incredibly dangerous. This how disruptive the last two years have been, even for people who didn't get sick. This has been terrible, and this virus was even "that bad" in the big scheme of things.
Is it possible that endeavours that most would classify as "good," genetic experiments involving vectors to insert genetic material with good aims- cancer therapies, transplant medicine could be responsible, do you think?
I don't know -- I've gotten the impression that "the good stuff" could be gotten by other safer means. (Read for example the linked Forbes article? I think that one addresses that.)
Yep, mix in a bit more transmissibility and a dash more pathogenicity and bingo!
Well at least it might slow down global warming.
Bws
ha!
About 1/3 of the way in you say "Edited, 5 Jan 2021" and I believe that should read 2022.
Lol thanks! Will fix.
Thank you very much for this essay. I think you raise some valid points. However, I was wondering how would you explain the BA.2 and BA.3 variants within this hypothesis?
So these are subvariants, meaning they evolved/mutated after omicron was already out in the world, and they seem to be doing what subvariants would normally do. I don't think they can speak (much) to the origin, except. for example, it would be interesting to look and see what types of new mutations they are developing, and for example whether those new mutations arise in a more normal ratio.
A very easy-to-read article that doesn’t skip the tough bits. Extremely worth the time for a better understanding of what happens in the world of microbiology, and what’s happening right now.
Thank you so much for taking the time to read this and comment, Tracy!