Crazy (and not-so-crazy) shit about Covid-19

[windwalker]

The main point, rule out the Lab, and what was being done there.

Haven't seen or read anything that would suggest anything else.

This WAS addressed way back in July [July 8, 2020] on page 103 of this thread. Your sources appear to be outdated, or are otherwise failing to account for the following study: https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.06.13.20129627v1

Most COVID-19 cases show mild influenza-like symptoms (14) and it has been suggested that some uncharacterized influenza cases may have masked COVID-19 cases in the 2019-2020 season (11). This possibility prompted us to analyze some archival WWTP samples from January 2018 to December 2019 (Figure 2). All samples came out to be negative for the presence of SARS-CoV-2 genomes with the exception of March 12, 2019, in which both IP2 and IP4 target assays were positive. This striking finding indicates circulation of the virus in Barcelona long before the report of any COVID-19 case worldwide. Barcelona is a business and commerce hub, as well as a popular venue for massive events, gathering visitors from many parts of the world. It is nevertheless likely that similar situations may have occurred in several other parts of the world, with circulation of unnoticed COVID-19 cases in the community.

"Haven't seen or read anything that would suggest anything else."

The discovery is puzzling, given the characteristics of COVID-19 outbreaks. The highly contagious respiratory illness would have ravaged Barcelona several months before the Wuhan epidemic, but that did not happen.

One possible explanation for the result is the accidental contamination of the March 2019 samples during testing. Another is that the result is a false positive.
Researchers tested for three genes and found a positive result for one of them, the RdRp gene.

They screened for two regions of the gene, and both were detected on the 39th cycle of amplification during PCR testing. The higher the number of amplification, the less specific the result, Science Alert notes. Scientists use 40 to 45 rounds of amplification in their testing.

The March 2019 sample could have contained RNA or DNA that resembled the test target after the 39th cycle.

https://bgr.com/science/coronavirus-tes ... 019-study/

A curious thing about this finding is that it disagrees with epidemiological data about the virus. The authors don’t cite reports of a spike in the number of respiratory disease cases in the local population following the date of the sampling.

Until this process of peer review has been completed, though, the evidence needs to be treated with caution.

https://theconversation.com/was-coronav ... 019-141582

[windwalker]

Made public Friday, the summary says that four elements of the intelligence community assess with “low confidence” that the initial SARS-CoV-2 infection was most likely caused by natural exposure to an animal infected with it or a close progenitor virus.

One agency found with “moderate confidence that the first human infection with SARS-CoV-2 most likely was the result of a laboratory-associated incident, probably involving experimentation, animal handling, or sampling by the Wuhan Institute of Virology,”
the summary says. A New York Times’ report on the summary suggests that agency is the FBI.

https://thebulletin.org/2021/08/intelli ... -pandemic/


Maybe they need to look in Barcelona

[origami_itto]

windwalker, you never answered my question.

If you are proven correct, and the virus is definitively traced to a lab leak, what call to action does that necessitate? What is the meaning we should draw from that fact? What should we do about it?

[LaoDan]

https://theconversation.com/was-coronavirus-really-in-europe-in-march-2019-141582

That analysis of the study is much better. We need to wait and see - but the study has now been peer reviewed and published here: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8091622/

I agree with this statement:

So, until further studies are carried out, it is best not to draw definitive conclusions.

This includes not drawing definitive conclusions about the origins of the virus coming from the Wuhan lab.

[Ian C. Kuzushi]

It should be clear that WW is not simply implying that the virus "escaped" from the lab, but that it was engineered on purpose. That's an important distinction.

He claims that no one has provided evidence to the contrary, but I have repeatedly (and no, not the debunked pre-China appearances of the virus in other countries).

It's also worth noting that he also equated this to the common flu, etc etc...

We've had people on this thread stating all sorts of "crazy shit about Covid-19," which I guess was a sort of self-fulfilling prophecy. Things like, "it's not a virus," and, "5-G."

The really slippery ones like Bruce just came on and make ad hominem attacks rather than saying anything meaningful. But he, too, eventually slipped up and let his ideologically driven mania out of the bag. To him, it's all about liberty. Of course, in that famous line, there's a pretty important word that comes before liberty...it also starts with an L. It's like a grade schooler's notion of how the world works. WW also tries to hedge by claiming he is just relaying information, not realizing that he is (like Bruce) incapable of vetting research or understanding data. They have both illustrated this on this thread and others, as have the other minimizers.

Going back and reading the thread should be quite embarrassing for them, as it should be for those who play the "both sides" game.

[windwalker]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oh2Sj_QpZOA

[origami_itto]

Looks like they've kept up their pandering to conspiracy theorists that others noticed in February.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-n ... paying-off

I mean they're interviewing Trump was a source and his proof is there were body bags.

Like I'd watch that but I feel like I'd end up dumber afterwards.

[windwalker]

Both cleavage site and specific RBD could result from site‐directed mutagenesis, a procedure that does not leave a trace. Considering the devastating impact of SARS‐CoV‐2 and importance of preventing future pandemics, researchers have a responsibility to carry out a thorough analysis of all possible SARS‐CoV‐2 origins.

The perfect binding ability of SARS‐CoV‐2 to human cells and the presence of the furin cleavage site, which is new for SARS‐like coronaviruses, might derive from genetic manipulation performed during evolutionary studies. By combining a bat coronavirus backbone and a receptor binding domain from pangolin coronavirus the resulting chimera would seem completely natural.

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7744920/

There is so far no scientifically validated evidence that directly supports a natural origin. Among the references cited in the two letters by Calisher and colleagues,1, 2 all but one simply show that SARS-CoV-2 is phylogenetically related to other betacoronaviruses. The fact that the causative agent of COVID-19 descends from a natural virus is widely accepted, but this does not explain how it came to infect humans.

An appeal for an objective, open, and transparent scientific debate about the origin of SARS-CoV-2
Jacques van Helden
Colin D Butler
Guillaume Achaz
Bruno Canard
Didier Casane
Jean-Michel Claverie
et al.
Show all authors
Published:September 17, 2021DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/S0140-6736(21)02019-5

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lanc ... 40-6736(21)02019-5/fulltext

[BruceP]

Lack of formal education does not equal lack of intelligence. Likewise, education does not equal brainwashing [not referring to your statements, but one thing that I often hear from those that seek to dismiss educated sources, including science].

That's almost into the philosophical realm of measuring the faculties of the mind to arrive at something quantifiable, which is way beyond anything I want to get into here. IMO intelligence is mostly only ascertainable on a sliding scale of relative measure according to who is interacting with whom. I do know better than to presume to know the operation of someone else's mind in order to malign their motives or character (not including you) - which is often the only reason anyone does that sort of thing. We do have a few clairvoyants participating in this discussion, though, so...

Apologies for the second link (to the video) I posted in my last reply. I didn't know it played without sound until I watched it this morning. I'm always careful to ensure the accuracy and truthfulness of 'news stories' I link here, as all msm practices shady 'journalism' with each having its own agenda. I was surprised (not really) that I couldn't find any canadian 'news outlets carrying the story. I can assure you, despite the source, that there isn't a single falsehood in any of that article - from the headline, the bullet-points below that, or the reporting of that update that was given by CMO Hinshaw. Everything written in that article is straight from the horse's mouth.

I was hoping you'd post your thoughts on the reasoning she outlined regards their change of tack on the counting and plans of action going forward. Playing fool's advocate, I included those links to illustrate a typical scenario in which people of 'average intelligence' see the erosion of their trust in people who are supposed to know what they're doing and are being trusted to guide policy, and sometimes dictate policy, despite the fact that they're non-elected officials who are often viewed as governing through the back door, as it were.

Anyway, here's the link to the CPAC coverage of Hinshaw's update - the part I was asking about earlier (goalposts) is at the 31:30 mark:



I should state that I've always harbored a bit of contempt for both the virtuous vaxxers and the outspoken, hesitant 'laypersons' who, between them, have created some really messed up social upheaval over the past year. I'm way the hell up north in a small, mostly unaffected community, where this whole situation has been some kinda theater, I tell ya what.

Anyway, I've learned a lot about a lot reading your posts in this thread and appreciate you sharing your knowledge. It's an honesty that is well geared for this contentious format - even the condescension has some gems.

[GrahamB]

Ian - a nice, clear accurate summation of everything that has gone before. You're too good for this place.

[Bao]

and no, not the debunked pre-China appearances of the virus in other countries

Everything is debunked? Every single trace or evidence of appearance in other countries is already debunked? Oh. Didn't know that...

What I see, some of the debunking is also speculations. This is a pretty good sum up of the critique:
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articl ... d-in-china

Obviously, people who are into the "China-Virus" narrative will try to discredit studies that might point to or suggest something else. I am not convinced.

There's a good point about viruses usually spreading weeks or moths before detected. I would also assume that it's a natural virus as every other outbreak and that it comes from nature. But I am not convinced that the first outbreak was in China. It could have been. But if it's a natural outbreak, it's just as likely as that it would have happened in another place. China is likely as well as the SARS outbreak happened there. But what suggests that China must be ground zero - or where the virus transferred from nature to human?

BTW...
It's interesting that they have found covid-19 in white-tailed dear. And they also have a corona virus that is the closest found yet to SARS COV-2

"A recent study conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) found evidence of COVID-19 exposure in white-tailed deer in four different states.

Of the 385 samples that were collected, 40% came back positive for COVID-19 antibodies, according to the study. "

...

"Samples were taken between Jan. 2020 and March 2021 from animals found in Illinois, Michigan, New York, and Pennsylvania, according to the USDA. "

https://www.q13fox.com/news/antibodies- ... study-says

Mmm... Maybe it really was circulating in the US at the same time it was detected in China?

[Giles]

BTW...
It's interesting that they have found covid-19 in white-tailed dear. And they also have a corona virus that is the closest found yet to SARS COV-2

"A recent study conducted by the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Animal and Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) found evidence of COVID-19 exposure in white-tailed deer in four different states.

Of the 385 samples that were collected, 40% came back positive for COVID-19 antibodies, according to the study. "

...

"Samples were taken between Jan. 2020 and March 2021 from animals found in Illinois, Michigan, New York, and Pennsylvania, according to the USDA. "

https://www.q13fox.com/news/antibodies- ... study-says

Mmm... Maybe it really was circulating in the US at the same time it was detected in China?

Whoa, hold your horses, Bao! You're getting things mixed up here - I hope/presume it's not intentional but these are two totally different things. As LaoDan also posted here, it's been shown that Covid-19 is now also present in many deer in the USA. But these animals do NOT play host to another "corona virus that is the closest found yet to SARS COV-2"! This latter recent news item ('closest to SARS COV-2') relates to bats in Laos:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02596-2

The article is short and clear in itself, so easy to read. I'll just highlight that, according to the researchers, this new finding is further evidence pointing to a natural origin of the virus in bats (as opposed to anything 'engineered'). Something which many and diverse researchers have been saying ever since early 2020. And moreover, an origin in bats in South-East Asia. As to whether the origin was indeed in China or originally another South-East Asian country and then only made it big-time in China:

"The study also doesn’t clarify how a progenitor of the virus could have travelled to Wuhan, in central China, where the first known cases of COVID-19 were identified — or whether the virus hitched a ride on an intermediate animal.

Answers might come from sampling more bats and other wildlife in southeast Asia, which many groups are doing.

Another preprint, also posted on Research Square and not yet peer reviewed, sheds light on the work under way in China7. For that study, researchers sampled some 13,000 bats between 2016 and 2021 across China. But they did not find any close relatives of SARS-CoV-2, and conclude that these are “extremely rare in bats in China”.

But other researchers question this claim. “I strongly disagree with the suggestion that relatives of SARS-CoV-2 may not be circulating in Chinese bats, as such viruses have already been described in Yunnan,” says Holmes."

So of course some of the main issues ('uncontrolled natural' or 'lab leak' and also 'China' or 'elsewhere') remain open. Although this new evidence tips the scales a little more towards 'natural'. But the source is certainly NOT deer in the USA. And on the basis of current findings, very probably not anywhere outside SE Asia.

[Giles]

As a follow-up to the 'bat virus' issue, I just found a nice article with a good (probable) explanation of why viruses from bats tend to be so dangerous to humans, more so than viruses arising in other animals:
https://www.discovermagazine.com/health/why-bats-are-breeding-grounds-for-deadly-diseases-like-ebola-and-sars

Of course, many well-known infectious diseases in humans have established origins in other animals, mostly from domesticated animals that we lived in (very) close proximity to for centuries. But bats seem to be in a league of their own.

[Bao]

Whoa, hold your horses, Bao! You're getting things mixed up here - I hope/presume it's not intentional but these are two totally different things. As LaoDan also posted here, it's been shown that Covid-19 is now also present in many deer in the USA. But these animals do NOT play host to another "corona virus that is the closest found yet to SARS COV-2"!

Yes, they are two different things. Actually, I saw an article about this that they should host a virus that looks close to SARS-COV-2, but obviously, this doesn't mean that it has anything to do with this actual virus. Can't find it again, that is what I mentioned it briefly, but I will keep looking for it.

This latter recent news item ('closest to SARS COV-2') relates to bats in Laos:
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02596-2

Interesting, haven't seen this one. Thanks.

As to whether the origin was indeed in China or originally another South-East Asian country and then only made it big-time in China:

"The study also doesn’t clarify how a progenitor of the virus could have travelled to Wuhan, in central China, where the first known cases of COVID-19 were identified — or whether the virus hitched a ride on an intermediate animal."

The bats studied about ten years ago, where they took samples from, the same that they gave to the US labs was from Yunnan. Yunnan is just across the border from Laos. Might be the same kind of bats and related viruses.

There's some other indications that the virus could have spread from nearby countries, on the border to China. So this is interesting indeed.

But the source is certainly NOT deer in the USA. And on the basis of current findings, very probably not anywhere outside SE Asia.

Well, as long as the Americans keep nagging about China without any proofs, I will continue to claim it came from the USA. This is just the fair thing to do.

[windwalker]

Studies have been going on for awhile,
with some in the US assisting, conducting studies of their own.

In 2007, the Shi group at WIV created a series of “bat‐man” CoV chimeric spike proteins while trying to determine what exactly confers CoVs the ability to jump from one species to another.

The researchers used different segments of the spike protein of the human SARS virus to replace corresponding segments in the spike protein of a bat viral backbone. It was concluded that a relatively short region (aa 310 to 518) of the spike protein “was necessary and sufficient to convert Rp3‐S into a huACE2‐binding molecule,” 29 that is to provide the bat CoV spike protein with a novel ability of binding to a human ACE2 receptor.

In 2008, the Baric group at the University of North Carolina (UNC) took the WIV research one step further: instead of using human immunodeficiency viruses (HIV) pseudo‐viruses with bat CoV spike proteins, a live chimeric CoV was created.

Following the experiments of their 2007 WIV colleagues,
the Baric group used a bat SARS‐like CoV as a backbone and replaced its RBD with the RBD from human SARS.[ 30 ]


In 2015, the Shi and Baric groups joined forces and published probably the most famous gain‐of‐function virology paper, which described the creation of another synthetic chimeric virus.[ 19 ] This time the RBD of a mouse‐adapted SARS backbone (SARS‐MA15) was replaced by the RBD of RsSHC014, a bat strain previously isolated from Yunnan bats in 2011 by the Shi group.

In 2016, the Baric group repeated their 2015 experiment using the same SARS‐MA15 backbone and the RBD from Rs3367,[ 31 ] a close relative of RsSHC014 also previously found in Yunnan by WIV and renamed “WIV1” after live culturing.[ 17 ]

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7744920/