The Potential Lab Origin of COVID-19

[Ludicus]

As anyone might have anticipated, it seems this “mission” served merely to rubber stamp official narratives.

As anyone? don't generalize. Feel free to believe in what you want. Who knows, may be the virus was used as a cover to install 5G across the world.

[Lord Thesaurian]

Well, they did fairly extensive sampling of potential natural sources:

And found nothing.

Makes sense. If the data collected doesn’t seem to either support or undermine the hypothesis in question, that hypothesis must be correct, and we only need “future studies” to confirm it.

[Ludicus]

Well, maybe, if I've understood it right, basically what the international mission says is "We are not able to leave China until we say it didn’t come from a lab". Makes sense.

[conon394]

Well, maybe, if I've understood it right, basically what the international mission says is "We are not able to leave China until we say it didn’t come from a lab". Makes sense.

Very likely since Daszak likely wants to keep his links to labs that UofT Galveston did not think were ready for prime time.

[Ludicus]

Anyone who knows anything about the yellow peril knows how China bought the WHO. It is a disgrace to see how Biden ordered the US to rejoin the WHO, the Paris accord and the UN Human rights Council as one of his first moves as president.
“Its extremely unlike” that the virus leaked from a lab, how dare they say that?


Download and read, “WHO-convened Global Study of the Origins of SARS-CoV-2： Terms of References for the China Part” (eight pages)

These Terms of References (ToRs) outline the scope of studies, set out the main guiding principles and key expected deliverables for these studies. Studies under these ToRs will aim to (i) explore how the circulation of SARS-CoV-2 might have started and (ii) gather evidence from the cluster of cases identified in December 2019 for potential links and clues as to its origin. Studies to address those points will be addressed in Phase 1 of the work. The result of Phase 1 studies will generate hypotheses that lay the ground for Phase 2 studies, which could be conducted elsewhere in China, in neighboring countries and globally. For example, susceptibility studies have demonstrated that several animal species could potentially play the role of intermediary host. This, combined with evidence from Wuhan, could help better guide future work into intermediary animal species in China and elsewhere. The approach will be open-minded, iterative, not excluding any hypothesis that could contribute to evidence generation and help narrow the focus of research. Findings from origin studies in China will advance origins tracing in other countries and may lead to similar work elsewhere. WHO will continue to work closely with the World Health Organization of Animal Health (OIE), the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations (FAO) and countries, as part of the One-Health Approach to identify the zoonotic source of the virus and the route of introduction to the human population, as per 73rd WHA resolution.

Here, final draft.
https://www.who.int/docs/default-sou...&download=true

[conon394]

So really its an allegation yellow peril type racism to suggest something happened again that demonstrably happened in the past:

https://www.virology.ws/2009/03/02/o...za-h1n1-virus/

The Chinese Lab(s) were new and invested in pass through modification for virus research. Key people in the WHO investigation are very invested in that research and have been key in dismissing concerns that have been raised over the past decade or so. I fairly certain the point I am making is that the same at this point theoretically a mistake/accident could likely have occurred at almost any other lab around the world. I have no particular blame to assign China but am more interested that a frank discussion of the the research direction that may have caused the issue is not going to get sufficient scrutiny after what looks like a lot of butt covering.

[Ludicus]

I’m not referring to, Conon."Yellow Peril" in the Age of COVID-19
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It can easily be said that the virus is a new tool of intimidation in the U.S.-China power rivalry. The other side of the coin, Conspiracy and debunking narratives about COVID-19 origins on social Chinese media.

WHO team begins COVID-19 origin investigation - The Lancet

Leendertz believes that Wuhan remains the best starting point. “I think the WHO philosophy is a good one. Start at the point which has the most solid description of human cases even if we do not know that the Wuhan wet market was the point where it first spilled over into humans or was simply the first mega spreading event.
From Wuhan we can go back in time to follow the evidence. The origin may stay in the region. It may go to another part of China. It may even go to another country.

--------------

Published in Nature Communications on 9 February. Evidence for SARS-CoV-2 related coronaviruses circulating in bats and pangolins in Southeast Asia...

(...) Further investigation with more systematic and longitudinal sampling of animals in their natural habitat is required to better understand the role of pangolins in transmitting and/or maintaining SARSr-CoVs.
In conclusion, the current study provides further experimental evidence to support the notion that the distribution of SC2r-CoVs is not limited to China. Southeast Asia, due to its richness in both relevant bat species diversity and population density, may be more likely to be a hotspot for such viruses²⁷. Our data also demonstrated the great genetic diversity and plasticity of the SC2r-CoV genomes. From the limited number of members (9 in total) of this lineage with published whole-genome sequences, they already display many differences that are unique to each of the members.

The rich diversity of SC2r-CoVs in the region suggests that there is a high probability to find the immediate progenitor virus of SARS-CoV-2 with intensified and internationally coordinated surveillance.

------

The broad distribution of the bats carrying SC1r-CoV and SC2r-CoV, that may include the originator of the SARS-CoV-2 outbreak.

Spoiler Alert, click show to read: 

[Lord Thesaurian]

The WHO has been unable to independently verify and analyze data from China since the beginning of the outbreak, and instead nodded along with what they were told by the CCP for fear of being shut out of the country altogether. If the recent past is any indication, that’s what the “investigation” will have amounted to.

Between the day the full genome was first decoded by a government lab on Jan. 2 and the day WHO declared a global emergency on Jan. 30, the outbreak spread by a factor of 100 to 200 times, according to retrospective infection data from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention. The virus has now infected over 6 million people worldwide and killed more than 375,000.

“It’s obvious that we could have saved more lives and avoided many, many deaths if China and the WHO had acted faster,” said Ali Mokdad, a professor at the Institute for Health Metrics and Evaluation at the University of Washington.

However, Mokdad and other experts also noted that if WHO had been more confrontational with China, it could have triggered a far worse situation of not getting any information at all.

If WHO had pushed too hard, it could even have been kicked out of China, said Adam Kamradt-Scott, a global health professor at the University of Sydney. But he added that a delay of just a few days in releasing genetic sequences can be critical in an outbreak. And he noted that as Beijing’s lack of transparency becomes even clearer, WHO director-general Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus’s continued defense of China is problematic.

“It’s definitely damaged WHO’s credibility,” said Kamradt-Scott. “Did he go too far? I think the evidence on that is clear….it has led to so many questions about the relationship between China and WHO. It is perhaps a cautionary tale.”

https://apnews.com/article/3c0617949...18d5aeaaed9fae

After initial denials and cover-ups, China successfully contained the COVID-19 outbreak—but not before it had exported many cases to the rest of the world. Today, despite the falsehoods it initially passed on, which played a critical role in delaying global response, it’s trying to leverage its reputed success story into a stronger position on international health bodies.

Most critically, Beijing succeeded from the start in steering the World Health Organization (WHO), which both receives funding from China and is dependent on the regime of the Communist Party on many levels. Its international experts didn’t get access to the country until Director-General Tedros Adhanom visited President Xi Jinping at the end of January. Before then, WHO was uncritically repeating information from the Chinese authorities, ignoring warnings from Taiwanese doctors—unrepresented in WHO, which is a United Nations body—and reluctant to declare a “public health emergency of international concern,” denying after a meeting Jan. 22 that there was any need to do so.

https://foreignpolicy.com/2020/04/02...th-soft-power/

The WHO formally ended its inquiry into a potential lab origin, even as scientists around the world say the search for the origins of the disease must continue after the “investigation” accomplished little in that regard.

What would it take to properly investigate possible lab origins? Dr. Relman said that “it will be critical to obtain independently verified, time-stamped records of sample inventories, data, lab notebooks and records, internal and external communications, personnel health records and serum samples, and access to personnel so that they can be interviewed in private without fear of repercussions.” Yet the path to such a credible investigation seems nearly impossible in the current geopolitical climate.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-wor...19-11610728316

Given that research has already confirmed the CCP coverup is directly responsible for the outbreak exploding into a global pandemic in the first place, and Beijing’s long and well documented history of similar behavior, from toxic baby formula to H1N1 to SARS to AIDS, it also seems impossible that we will ever know the truth about how the disease originated and initially spread.

[Ludicus]

from toxic baby formula..

I think you are talking about the 2008 chinese milk scandal that killed 6 babies and made 300,00 ill. In the United States, Gerber, Enfamil, Plum Organics and Sprout were among the worst offenders in 2107/18.And more recently-2021, levels of toxic metals were found in baby food brands. Let’s also not forget that the scale of America’s lead problem is astonishing.It was everywhere': how lead is poisoning America's poorest ...
Let's also keep in mind that in our splendid West, thalidomide induced teragogenesis was the biggest man-made medical disaster ever.Thalidomide victims say drug company's apology is an insult
--

....to H1N1 to SARS to AIDS, it also seems impossible that we will ever know the truth about how the disease originated and initially spread.

Not at all.
Influenza A virus subtype H1N1 - was first known to have spread across the world from June 1918 to December 1919. The contemporary epidemiological evidence the epidemiological evidence- the only evidence available- suggests that the most likely site of origin was Haskell County, Kansas. If the virus did not originate in Haskell, there is no good explanation for how it arrived there. Read the great contemporary epidemiologists (see a previous post, link provided).

In any case, we know for sure that a new strain of the influenza A (H1N1) virus, popularly termed swine flu, first broke out in Mexico in March 2009. The first swine flu cases were reported in the United States in the middle of April. The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed and declared a health emergency on April 26. Soon after, incidences of H1N1 flu were reported in other countries. On June 11, the WHO raised the worldwide pandemic alert to its highest level, Phase 6. As of April 10, 2010, the total number of infected individuals all over the world reached 61 million; 12,470 people died from the disease (WHO, 2010a). On August 10, 2010, the WHO declared that the global pandemic was over. By August 2010, for example, the total reported laboratory confirmed influenza-associated hospitalizations reached 50,900 and the total reported deaths were 2,710. In China, 128,033 hospitalizations and 805 deaths are reported (Minister of Health of the People‘s Republic of China, 2010).
More, Pandemic (H1N1) 2009, Shanghai, China - NCBI - NIH

AIDS
The origin of the AIDS pandemic has been traced to Africa.From kinshasa to to the Caribbean, New York(1971)and San Francisco(1976), and from there to the whole world.In China the first case was an American tourist who died in 1985. Its interesting to note that- I quote,

In response to the small outbreak among people living with hemophilia who had received contaminated factor VIII from the United States, the Chinese government banned the importation of blood products. This abrupt decline in imported blood supply suddenly created high demand for domestic blood products

And that led total disaster.The whole story History of the HIV Epidemic in China - NCBI - NIH
Btw, in the United States, HIV diagnoses per 100,000 people? See the interactive map https://map.aidsvu.org/map

SARS-COV-2 pandemic.
To misquote Woddy Allen, on a lighter tone: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex Covid (But Were Afraidto Ask).
Seriously now,if you are interested in knowing in detail, read the superb texbook. 6th Edition, constantly updated,exhaustive bibliography http://www.bsk1.com/CRDownload.html, uploaded on 14 February 2021. (510 pages)
Read the details about all the countries and continents. Short Content:Top 10 articles,Epidemiology,Transmission, Prevention,Virology, Variants, Vaccines, Diagnostic Tests and Procedures,Clinical Presentation, Long COVID-19, Treatment, Severe COVID-19, Co-morbidities, Pediatrics,The First 7 Months.

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Page 28

First outbreak (China) China was caught by surprise by the COVID-19 outbreak – as any other nation would have been – but “thanks” to the experience of the SARS outbreak in 2003 (Kamps-Hoffmann 2003), was prepared for it. At first, the epidemic spread within Wuhan and Hubei Province (December 2019, Li Q 2020) and then nationwide to all provinces in January 2020, favored by travelers departing from Wuhan before the Chinese Spring Festival (Zhong 2020, Jia JS 2020).
However, within 3 weeks from the identification of the new virus, the government ordered the lockdown of more than 50 million people in Wuhan and the surrounding province of Hubei, as well as strict quarantine measures and travel restrictions for hundreds of millions of Chinese citizens. This astonishing first in human history achieved what even specialists did not dare to dream: curbing an epidemic caused by a highly contagious virus (Lau 2020).
As early as four weeks after the Wuhan lockdown, there was evidence that strict containment measures were capable of curbing a SARS-CoV-2 epidemic as shown in Figure 1.1. The lesson from China: it is possible to lockdown entire provinces or countries and lockdown works. Some health authorities in the Western Hemisphere followed the example of China (Italy, for example, ordered a lockdown as early as 18 days after the diagnosis of the first autochthonous case), other governments did not. It cannot be overemphasized that China has basically managed to control the spread of SARS-CoV-2 since March. How was that possible (Burki 2020)?

See fig 1.1

Page 158 - Origin and Evolution

There has been considerable discussion regarding the origin of SARS-CoV-2. Currently there are numerous articles in scientific journals, pre-publication servers, as well as conspiracy theories on social and popular media. The most controversial of theories center around a laboratory engineered virus or bioweaponry.
One of the major contributors to this theory was a preprint article where authors (Pradhan 2020) reported disconcerting similarities between SARS-CoV-2 spike glycoprotein (S) and HIV-1 envelope glycoprotein gp120 and gag protein. The implication of the article was that SARS-CoV-2 may have been manufactured using gene fragments from the HIV-1 genome.

The article received extensive scrutiny from various peers internationally. It was quickly refuted after extensive bioanalysis demonstrated that there was no evidence amino acid sequences within the s-glycoprotein were HIV-1 specific nor obtained from HIV-1 (Xiao C 2020). Other claims supporting a laboratory engineered virus was based on a study where construction of a chimeric mouse/bat CoV was capable of infecting human cells in vitro [Menachery 2015]. Investigation into these claims making use of whole genome sequencing compared SARS-CoV-2 to several artificial CoV.

Significant divergence between their genomes was identified making it improbable that they are interrelated. Additionally, SARS-CoV-2 is not derived from a previously used virus backbone, and contains randomly occurring mutations favouring natural evolution rather than synthetic construction (Andersen 2020, Dalavilla 2020, Liu S 2020). Other concerns involve theories of an escaped “natural” laboratory virus during basic research involving passage of bat-CoV. While this may be plausible, especially when considering incidents of inadvertent laboratorty escapes of SARS-CoV, the unique RBD region and acquisition of O-linked glycans make a natural origin and evolution more realistic.

Several early reports of COVID-19 are linked to the Huanan Seafood and Wholesale Market in Wuhan, China, where wildlife was sold suggesting an animal source and zoonotic origin of the outbreak (Lau S 2020). Comparative genomics and phylogenetic analysis provide insight into the origin and evolution of SARS-CoV-2 by identifying the closest CoV relative and by extension, potential reservoir hosts (Andersen 2020). While multiple publications have investigated the genetic relatedness between SARS-CoV-2 with SARS-CoV (79%), MERS-CoV (50%), and other CoV, it is a previously isolated bat CoV, Bat-CoV-RaTG13 (RaTG13), that is identified as the closest relative. RaTG13, sampled from Rhinolophus affinis bats, shares >96% sequence identity across the entire genome (Xiao K 2020, Zhou P 2020).

Notably, another batCoV isolated from Rhinolophus Malayanus, denoted RmYN02, was shown to share 93% homology with SARS-CoV-2. However, low sequence identity in the spike protein’s receptor binding domain (RBD) make it an unlikey candidate to be the exact CoV variant responsible for the outbreak [Zhou H 2020]. Nevertheless, given the similarities and close phylogenetic relationship to batCoV, it is reasonable to infer that SARS-CoV-2 originated in bats. Despite close homology between SARS-CoV-2 and RaTG13, there are fundamental differences in the RBD region responsible for human ACE-2 receptor binding.

The RBD of SARS-CoV-2 binds efficiently to ACE-2 whereas RaTG13 does not. Divergence in the RBD is significant as it implies that RaTG13 is unlikely to be a direct progenitor of SARS-CoV-2 and an intermediate host is required for zoonotic transmission. Malayan pangolins (Manis javanica) are the host of several SARS-related CoV. Remarkably, the RBD regions of pangolin-CoV exhibit >97% amino acid homology in all six key amino acid residues that are required for ACE-2 receptor binding (Andersen 2020, Xiao K 2020).

When considering that bats are the major reservoir of SARSr-CoV in conjunction with animal mixing occuring at food markets and smuggling centres, its plausible that pangolin-CoV originated from bat-CoV. Subsequent recombination events and natural selection between RaTG13 and Pangolin-CoV would allow a precursor virus to acquire an ACE2-encoding gene (Andersen 2020, Xiao K 2020). Crossover to humans could have arisen by various means; pangolin meat is considered a delicacy in some cultures and the scales have been reportedly used in Chinese traditional medicine. Lastly, SARS-CoV-2 has a unique polybasic cleavage site that is found neither in Pangolin-CoV or RaTG13 making it improbable that they are direct progenitors (Andersen 2020, Malaiyan 2020). Overall, these data infer that SARS-CoV-2 is likely a recombinant virus originating from bats with pangolins serving as an intermediate host with eventual human transmission (Lau S 2020, Xiao K 2020).

Another possibility is that natural selection occurred in humans after zoonotic transfer. A progenitor virus transmitted to humans could acquire an ACE-2 coding gene via adaptation during a period of undetected human to human transmission allowing the pandemic to manifest. This scenario is however less likely as all SARS-CoV-2 sequenced thus far have key genomic features and are derived from a common ancestor with the same features. Furthermore, high nucleotide homology between the RBD region in Pangolin-SARSrCoV infers that it was a progenitor virus (Andersen 2020, Lau S 2020).

Scientific evidence supports natural evolution of SARS-CoV-2 originating through zoonotic means with the hypothesis of a laboratory manipulated virus highly improbable (Dallavilla 2020). Currently there is no animal CoV that has sufficient homology to serve as the direct progenitor of SARS-CoV-2. Given the massive diversity of CoV in bats and other species, without testing a large reservoir of animals for viruses, it remains challenging to identify the true progenitor.

[Lord Thesaurian]

I think you are talking about the 2008 chinese milk scandal that killed 6 babies and made 300,00 ill. In the United States, Gerber, Enfamil, Plum Organics and Sprout were among the worst offenders in 2107/18.And more recently-2021, levels of toxic metals were found in baby food brands. Let’s also not forget that the scale of America’s lead problem is astonishing.It was everywhere': how lead is poisoning America's poorest ...
Let's also keep in mind that in our splendid West, thalidomide induced teragogenesis was the biggest man-made medical disaster ever.Thalidomide victims say drug company's apology is an insult
--

Not at all.
Influenza A virus subtype H1N1 - was first known to have spread across the world from June 1918 to December 1919. The contemporary epidemiological evidence the epidemiological evidence- the only evidence available- suggests that the most likely site of origin was Haskell County, Kansas. If the virus did not originate in Haskell, there is no good explanation for how it arrived there. Read the great contemporary epidemiologists (see a previous post, link provided).

In any case, we know for sure that a new strain of the influenza A (H1N1) virus, popularly termed swine flu, first broke out in Mexico in March 2009. The first swine flu cases were reported in the United States in the middle of April. The U.S. Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) confirmed and declared a health emergency on April 26. Soon after, incidences of H1N1 flu were reported in other countries. On June 11, the WHO raised the worldwide pandemic alert to its highest level, Phase 6. As of April 10, 2010, the total number of infected individuals all over the world reached 61 million; 12,470 people died from the disease (WHO, 2010a). On August 10, 2010, the WHO declared that the global pandemic was over. By August 2010, for example, the total reported laboratory confirmed influenza-associated hospitalizations reached 50,900 and the total reported deaths were 2,710. In China, 128,033 hospitalizations and 805 deaths are reported (Minister of Health of the People‘s Republic of China, 2010).
More, Pandemic (H1N1) 2009, Shanghai, China - NCBI - NIH

AIDS
The origin of the AIDS pandemic has been traced to Africa.From kinshasa to to the Caribbean, New York(1971)and San Francisco(1976), and from there to the whole world.In China the first case was an American tourist who died in 1985. Its interesting to note that- I quote,

And that led total disaster.The whole story History of the HIV Epidemic in China - NCBI - NIH
Btw, in the United States, HIV diagnoses per 100,000 people? See the interactive map https://map.aidsvu.org/map

SARS-COV-2 pandemic.
To misquote Woddy Allen, on a lighter tone: Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Sex Covid (But Were Afraidto Ask).
Seriously now,if you are interested in knowing in detail, read the superb texbook. 6th Edition, constantly updated,exhaustive bibliography http://www.bsk1.com/CRDownload.html, uploaded on 14 February 2021. (510 pages)
Read the details about all the countries and continents. Short Content:Top 10 articles,Epidemiology,Transmission, Prevention,Virology, Variants, Vaccines, Diagnostic Tests and Procedures,Clinical Presentation, Long COVID-19, Treatment, Severe COVID-19, Co-morbidities, Pediatrics,The First 7 Months.

----
Page 28

See fig 1.1

Page 158 - Origin and Evolution

It never ceases to amaze me how one can consistently respond at length to my posts and yet say nothing of any relevance, to an extent that regularly borders on off topic. Independent of your knee-jerk inclination to rhetorically defend the totalitarian communist government of China, I never suggested China is the only country that had a scandal involving toxic metals, or that H1N1 or AIDS originated in China. I guess you haven’t looked into those in the context of this conversation. Those are all examples of “similar behavior” to what we’ve seen during COVID by the CCP, ergo why would this time be any different?

The Biden Admin appears to understand this:

The White House on Saturday called on China to make available data from the earliest days of the Covid-19 outbreak, saying it has "deep concerns" about the way the findings of the World Health Organization's coronavirus report were communicated.

White House national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in a statement that it is imperative that the report be independent and free from "alteration by the Chinese government", echoing concerns raised by the administration of former President Donald Trump, who also moved to quit the WHO over the issue.

"It is imperative that this report be independent, with expert findings free from intervention or alteration by the Chinese government," Sullivan said.

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/joe...mands-n1257850

[Ludicus]

It never ceases to amaze me how one can consistently respond at length to my posts and yet say nothing of any relevance, to an extent that regularly borders on off topic. Independent of your knee-jerk inclination to rhetorically defend the totalitarian communist government of China, I never suggested China is the only country that had a scandal involving toxic metals, or that H1N1 or AIDS originated in China

Oh really.You're not supposed to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. No, you never suggested China is the only country that had a scandal involving toxic metals, or that H1N1 or AIDS originated in China, but you had commented on "Beijing’s long and Beijing’s long and well documented history of similar behavior, from toxic baby formula to H1N1 to SARS to AIDS"

And that is false, so I took steps to prove you wrong, in what concerns the the H1N1 Chinese approach to H1N1 and AIDS epidemics. And btw, the COVID Reference textbook wasn’t written by the Chinese Communist Party, read or read the page 28. Read also China's pragmatic approach to AIDS - WHO
Let's talk agains about the 2009 H1N1. So, what have they done horrible wrong? Tell me what was China's mortal sin?
An Evaluation of China's Influenza A (H1N1) Emergency
----
The harsh reality.
The Lancet doesn't belong to the Chinese Communist Party. China's successful control of COVID-19 - The Lancet ...
How China Controlled the Coronavirus | The New Yorker

I tried to convey the idea that the current American failure doesn’t narrowly reflect national character or values but, rather, a collapse of system: a crisis of leadership and institutional structures.

And many aspects of the Chinese strategy could never be adopted in America or in any other democracy. The strict policy of isolating individuals who test positive is also applied to children, who are separated from their parents even if they are asymptomatic.

Such dramatic examples tend to distract from more useful elements of the Chinese approach. The Chinese epidemiologist in Shanghai had also worked for many years in the U.S., and I asked if there was anything that Americans could realistically learn from China.

“Community engagement,” he said immediately.“We don’t have the neighborhood-committee structure in the U.S., but it’s important to find some alternative.” He noted that public-health services mighthave served this purpose if the American system had been properly funded.Jennifer Nuzzo, an epidemiologist at the Johns Hopkins Center for HealthSecurity, told me that contact tracing is something of a lost art in the U.S.“We did a study of the measles outbreak in 2019, and they were doing minimalcontact tracing,” she said. “It’s so incredibly resource-oriented, and publichealth has been decimated.”

From my perspective, there are also issues of education and effort. Despite the political indoctrination involved in Chinese schooling, the system teaches people to respect science.Hard work is another core value, and somehow society has become more prosperous without losing its edge. Nearly a quarter century ago, I taught young people who were driven by the desire to escape poverty; these days, my middle-class students seem to work at least as hard, because of the extreme competitiveness of their environment. Such qualities are perfect for fighting the pandemic, at least when channelled effectively by government structures. In comparison, the American response often appears passive—even enlightened citizens seem to believe that obeying lockdown orders and wearing masks in public is enough. But any attempt to control the virus requires active, organized effort, and there needs to be strong institutional direction.

Instead, the flailing American leadership seems more interested in finding scapegoats, sometimes with a racial tinge—the Kung Flu and the China Virus.

[Lord Thesaurian]

Oh really.You're not supposed to be so blind with patriotism that you can't face reality. No, you never suggested China is the only country that had a scandal involving toxic metals, or that H1N1 or AIDS originated in China, but you had commented on "Beijing’s long and Beijing’s long and well documented history of similar behavior, from toxic baby formula to H1N1 to SARS to AIDS"

And that is false, so I took steps to prove you wrong, in what concerns the the H1N1 Chinese approach to H1N1 and AIDS epidemics.

You did no such thing. Furthermore, if you’re going to accuse others of refusing to accept reality, it’s best if your argument doesn’t rely on willful ignorance of basic facts:

Finally, Chinese leaders have been caught red-handed lying about basic facts and one inevitably wonders what else they have been misleading the world for the past 20 years.
While it is good that they are belatedly grappling with the SARS crisis, the real question is what salutary lessons are they going to draw from this? It is too early to tell if China's new leadership led by the General Secretary, Hu Jintao, will grasp this opportunity, as Mikhail Gorbachev used the 1983 Chernobyl nuclear accident, to push for political reforms.

https://www.irishtimes.com/news/chin...nesty-1.357474

The Chinese military surgeon who exposed the government’s cover-up of the the severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) epidemic in 2003 has been under de facto house arrest since last year, according to his friends and family.

https://www.theguardian.com/world/20...jiang-yangyong

In a damning indictment of China’s efforts to control the spread of HIV/AIDS, an international human rights organisation has accused the country’s central and local authorities of a cover-up that fosters discrimination, prevents adequate treatment, and threatens to worsen what is already one of the world’s largest outbreaks of the disease.

https://www.thelancet.com/pdfs/journ...3603143504.pdf

Chinese authorities ordered a cover-up of a tainted milk scandal that has poisoned tens of thousands of babies because they feared social unrest if the news was made public.

Senior officials gave the order to Sanlu, the company whose poisoned milk powder is said to be responsible for at least four deaths and illnesses in almost 53,000 infants.

https://www.smh.com.au/world/chinese...0925-4o50.html

Public health emergencies should be handled quickly, transparently, and devoid of political considerations. But public health is inherently political and, with anything involving China, politics can never be fully excised. For Chinese Communist officials, particularly at the provincial level, there is an innate tendency to cover up and conceal, their long-imbued penchant for secrecy always taking precedence over trifling concerns like promoting public awareness and advocating proper precautions.

That was certainly the case in late 1997, just after China’s assumed sovereignty over Hong Kong, when the territory was hit by an outbreak of the H5N1 virus known as “bird flu.” Well into the outbreak, with people sick and some dying, Hong Kong officials were reluctant to finger China as the source, even though 80% of the territory’s poultry came from the mainland. Hong Kong ordered the slaughter of more than 1.3 million chickens, ducks, pigeons, and other birds, but officials were still nonsensically hesitant to point to China as the culprit behind the contagion out of fear of contradicting Beijing, which insisted — wrongly — that all its chickens were healthy.

https://www.statnews.com/2020/01/27/...eating-itself/

As Caijing magazine noted, the cost borne by public health personnel, H1N1 patients and those who had close contact with them were secondary to the issue of social and economic stability. True, Party leaders emphasised ‘science’ and the ‘rule by law’ in undertaking the anti-H1N1 measures. Yet, when they made H1N1 prevention and control a top priority, and warned that it would punish any failures to contain the spread of the disease, non-scientific and heavy- handed measures became more appealing to local government officials, who found it safer to be overzealous than to be seen as ‘soft’.

What can we learn from these two countries’ responses to the H1N1 pandemic? A comparison of the effectiveness of the two strategies clearly points to the inferiority of the containment strategy in handling the H1N1 pandemic. The containment approach is costly, unsustainable, inflexible and impractical. When adopted at the very beginning of the outbreak, it may help slow down the transmission of the virus. But, against the backdrop of globalisation, it is impossible to institute barriers against such spread. Moreover, it may complicate efforts of surge capacity building when a shift to mitigation becomes necessary. Interestingly, China looked to a centuries-old approach to contain the rapid spread of the H1N1 flu pandemic, even though both scientific data and historical evidence suggested the limits of this approach.

https://www.cfr.org › contentPDFWeb resultsComparing the H1N1 Crises and Responses in the US and China - Council on Foreign Relations

Axios has compiled a timeline of the earliest weeks of the coronavirus outbreak in China, highlighting when the cover-up started and ended — and showing how, during that time, the virus already started spreading around the world, including to the United States.

Why it matters: A study published in March indicated that if Chinese authorities had acted three weeks earlier than they did, the number of coronavirus cases could have been reduced by 95% and its geographic spread limited.

This timeline, compiled from information reported by the Wall Street Journal, the Washington Post, the South China Morning Post and other sources, shows that China's cover-up and the delay in serious measures to contain the virus lasted about three weeks.

https://www.axios.com/timeline-the-e...l&stream=world

[Ludicus]

You did no such thing. it’s best if your argument doesn’t rely on willful ignorance of basic facts:

Oh dear, I will refrain from commenting on this tirade.

---
AIDS revisited,
Characterizing the HIV/AIDS Epidemic in the in the United States and China... - NCBI - NIH
(2016)

The HIV/AIDS data from the national surveillance systems of China and the United States from 1985 to 2014 were compared to characterize the HIV/AIDS epidemic in both countries. The current estimated national HIV prevalence rate in China and the United States are 0.0598% and 0.348%, respectively.

Overall, China lags about a decade behind the United States in the HIV/AIDS epidemic. The number of annual new infections in the United States has been stable for more than a decade; however, in China it still appears to be on an upward trend. To some extent, the HIV/AIDS epidemic in China is going through what had been a trend experienced previously in the United States. A comparison of the HIV/AIDS epidemic in the two countries will be of constructive significance to help control the epidemic in both countries. More importantly, guidance for China’s epidemic control efforts may be gained from the United States’ experience

The AIDS incidence rate in China,2019 : 5.1 out of 100,000 people in China had AIDS as of 2019.
In the US, HIV incidence remained stable in 2018 as compare with 2014. The estimated number of HIV infections was 36,400 and the rate was 13.3 per 100,000 people

Well, what are you trying to say?
-----
The SARS 2002 epidemic in China is a case study.
It’s easy to say that after five months of denial, growing external pressure forced the Chinese leaders to shift into action between late March and early April 2003.Susan Puska wrote a a whole book about it (and I wasted my time reading it). She also wrote a book about China’s Imcomplete Military Transformation, Assessing the Weaknesses of People’s Liberation Army.
Frankly, my dear, I don't give a damn about political rethoric.

As I have already quoted (Covid Reference texbook) , “China was caught by surprise by the COVID-19 outbreak – as any other nation would have been – but “thanks” to the experience of the SARS outbreak in 2003 (Kamps-Hoffmann 2003), was prepared for it”
SARS revisited,
Third Edition Download
170 pages, PDF, 1.7 MB

Just over three months ago, SARS started to spread around the world.It is the first major new infectious disease of this century and it is taking full advantage of the opportunities provided by a world of international travel.
Intitial Research
The epidemic of severe atypical pneumonia which was observed in the Chinese province of Guangdong and reported internationally on February 11, 2003 (WHO, WER 11/2003), was initially suspected to belinked to a newly emerging influenza virus: on February 19, 2003, researchers isolated an avian influenza A (H5N1) virus from a child in Hong Kong. This virus was similar to the influenza virus originating from birds that caused an outbreak in humans in Hong Kong in 1997, and new outbreaks of similar strains were expected. However, bird 'flu', possibly of poultry origin, was soon ruled out as the cause of the newly-termed Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome, or SARS.
Investigations then focused on members of the Paramyxoviridae family, after paramyxovirus-like particles were found by electron microscopy of respiratory samples from patients in Hong Kong and Frankfurt am Main. Further investigations showed that human metapneumovirus (hMPV; van den Hoogen) was present in a substantial number of, but not in all, SARS patients reported at the time.At about the same time, China reported the detection, by electron microscopy, of Chlamydia-like organisms in patients who had died from atypical pneumonia during the Guangdong outbreak. Again, this finding could not be confirmed by other laboratories in SARS patients from outside China. On March 17, 2003, the WHO called upon eleven laboratories in nine countries to join a network for multicenter research into the etiology of SARS and to simultaneously develop a diagnostic test (http://www.who.int/csr/sars/project/en/). The member institutions communicated through regular telephone conferences (initially held on a daily basis) and via a secure website and exchanged data, samples and reagents to facilitate and speed up research into the etiology of SARS (World Health Organization Multicentre Collaborative Network for Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome (SARS) Diagnosis + WHO. WHO Multicentre Collaborative Networks for Severe AcuteRespiratory Syndrome (SARS) diagnosis.
http://www.who.int/wer/pdf/2003/wer7815.pdf).
The Breakthrough
The etiologic agent of SARS was identified in late March 2003, when laboratories in Hong Kong, the United States, and Germany found evidence of a novel coronavirus in patients with SARS.

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SARS-CoV-2 revisited.

According to the news,while in Wuhan, Thea Koelsen Fischer- Professor at Univ. of Copenhagen, Denmark - said she did not get to see the raw data and had to rely on an analysis of the data that was presented to her. And then she said that would be true in most countries. Thea on Twitter,

We DID build up a good relationship in the Chinese/Int Epi-team! Allowing for heated arguments reflects a deep level of engagement in the room. Our quotes are intendedly twisted casting shadows over important scientific work

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Interview with Peter Ben Embarek,Science Magazine.Excerpts.

Q: Now that you’ve been there, do you have more reason to say it’s “extremely unlikely” than before?

A: Yes. We had long meetings with the staff of the Wuhan Institute of Virology and three other laboratories in Wuhan. They talked about these claims openly. We discussed: What did you do over the past year to dismiss this claim? What did you yourself develop in terms of argumentations? Did you do audits yourself? Did you look at your records? Did you test your staff? And they explained how they worked and what kind of audit system they had. They had retrospectively tested serum from their staff. They tested samples from early 2019 and from 2020. There were a lot of discussions that we could not have had if we had not traveled to Wuhan. We also did not have evidence provided by outsiders to support any of the claims out there. That could potentially have tipped the balance. What we saw and discussed gave us much more confidence in our assessment. The consensus was that this is an unlikely scenario.

Q: Another scenario that you outlined was that the virus was transmitted through frozen food. What is the evidence for that?

A: This scenario is an interesting one because of the findings we made in the Huanan market, which is a wholesale market selling a lot of frozen products and refrigerated products—animal products, meat products, and seafood. And we know that the virus persists for a very long time on frozen products. China has reported over the past months a few instances where they have isolated the virus and positive samples on imported frozen products.
But that’s happening in 2020, at a time where the virus is widely circulating in the world, where there are multiple outbreaks in food factories around the world. It is probably an extremely rare event; we can see that from only a few dozen positive findings in China, out of 1.4 million samples taken so far. It’s potentially possible, so it’s worth exploring. But we have to separate the situation in 2020 with imported goods in China, and the situation in 2019, where that was not a possible route of introduction. There were no widespread outbreaks of COVID-19 in food factories around the world.
There is a much more likely scenario. Some traders at the Huanan market were trading in farmed wild animals—badgers, bamboo rats, rabbits, crocodiles, and many others. Several of these animals are known to be susceptible to SARS [severe acute respiratory syndrome] viruses. Some of them come from farms in provinces where coronaviruses have been isolated from bats: Guangdong Guanxi, Yunnan. Potentially, some of these animals were infected at those farms and then brought the virus into the market.

It is [time] to go back to the suppliers and to the farms and explore what type of species were there. Was there a mix of species? Were new animals introduced to the farms on a regular basis, as new breeding stock or whatever? Did they get supplies of animals from other places? Were there other farms nearby of interest? And of course, doing a lot of testing of all these animals and surroundings and environment.
As to bats: In recent weeks, we’ve had reports new interesting viruses, from Thailand and from Cambodia. We’re also interested in looking at the bat population in a wider area; finding more viruses could help us narrow down the evolutionary pathway of this coronavirus. And also doing more systematic studies on other animal species of interest, in China in particular, that we know are susceptible: minks, raccoon dogs, foxes. There are a number of farming systems that will be of interest to us.

Q: At the press conference you also said it was becoming clearer that there was no widespread transmission of the virus before December 2019. But there have been reports that China did not share all of the data on 92 patients who had flulike symptoms in 2019. (One team member has tweeted that her quotes on that topic were “twisted,” however.) How confident are you that there was no spread of the virus prior to December 2019, what data are still missing, and why?

A: Part of the process of trying to find older cases than early December was to look at data coming out of different surveillance systems. The Chinese colleagues in advance of our arrival identified 72,000 cases from surveillance system for influenzalike illness, fever, and pneumonia. In principle, they could be potential COVID cases. So, they tried to apply some kind of logical set of criteria to try to get to a smaller number of cases that would be worth exploring further. They went down to 92 cases. They were looking at a period first of October to December 2019, and there was no clustering in any way among these 92 cases. Then using serological tests [which look for antibodies to past SARS-CoV-2 infections], they managed to test 67 of these 92; the others were either unavailable, could not be traced, or had died. All 67 turned out negative.
We assessed all of this work and suggested further studies. The idea now is to try to use other strategies to better assess these 67 cases or 92 cases. For example, by also doing serological tests on some confirmed cases from December 2019. If those are still positive, that gives better confidence that the 92 are [truly] negative; if some of the confirmed cases are now negative, it puts a question mark on the value of the serological test.
The other thing is that going down from 72,000 down to 92 shows that the criteria were perhaps a bit too stringent. It might be a better idea to revisit the process and find a less stringent set of criteria so maybe we end up at 1000 cases or so and then do the same evaluation.

Q: If you take all of this together, what do we know? What’s the most likely scenario for how and when SARS-CoV-2 started to circulate?

A: It’s now clear that during the second half of December [2019] there was wide circulation of the virus in Wuhan. The contribution of the market at that time was not so important anymore because the virus was also circulating elsewhere in the city. That, to me, is a big finding. That was not the picture we had before. The cases outside the market were showing differences in terms of [virus] sequence diversity. Whether that indicates multiple introductions to the city or a single introduction a little bit earlier, followed by spread in different parts of the city, is still unclear. But it all points towards an introduction in the human population in that area in the period October to early December 2019—most probably late November, not so long before the earliest cases were found. But the route of introduction remains a mystery.
Q: You have the eyes of the world on you. You are working in a country that plays by its own rules. Isn’t there a danger that if you concentrate on the science, you end up being politically naïve? Some people have said the Wuhan press conference was basically a public relations (PR) win for the Chinese government.

A: The politics was always in the room with us on the other side of the table. We had anywhere between 30 and 60 Chinese colleagues, and a large number of them were not scientists, not from the public health sector. We know there was huge scrutiny on the scientific group from the other sectors. So, the politics was there constantly. We were not naïve, and I was not naïve about the political environment in which we tried to operate and, let’s face it, that our Chinese counterparts were operating under.
I don’t think the press conference was a PR win for China. I think the outcome of the mission is a win for the international scientific community. We managed to find a way of getting studies done that would otherwise not have been done. The politicization of events has not helped over the past year. But I think we’ve got the best out of it.
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---------
From the last edition of the COVID reference textbook,page 41,

“Like in Iran, where the regime covered up news of the coronavirus for three days to avoid impacting on the turnout at parliamentary elections on 21 February, domestic politics (or paranoia, see BMJ, 6 March 2020) influenced the epidemic response in the USA.
Scientific advice from CDC and other national public health institutions was ignored (The Lancet 2020).
The US is now the country with the highest number of cases and deaths. Without their unprecedented vacuum in leadership (NEJM Editors 2020), most of these deaths could have been prevented. And Brazil, which is also not an example of good governance performance, has become the country with the second highest number of deaths in the world”.

The Denialist Playbook - Scientific American
Trump's COVID Denial The Atlantic
The Heedless Horseman Republicans and their COVID denial ...Lie of the Year: The Downplay and Denial of the Coronavirus ...

They refused to act': inside a chilling documentary on Trump's bungled Covid-19 response...

Totally Under Control recounts the early days of the pandemic in the US, revealing in clinical detail a disastrous federal response to a preventable crisis.

Trailer,


Totally Under Control movie review (2020) | Roger Ebert

Watching “Totally Under Control” you really get the sense that the powers that be really don’t give a damn that there’s a thousand new cases a day, nor that masks have become a symbol of patriotism only if you don’t wear them.

--------
BTW, Trump sold most of the US’s protective masks to China in February 2020.The CS China Covid Procurement Service was created to encourage American producers like 3M to sell their inventories of N95 masks to China.
One month later they were forced to import them, The Trump administration forced states to bid eBay-style for ...

... even though Trump learned on January 23 that the coronavirus had the potential to spread globally.

----
I refuse to see SARS, AIDS and SarS Cov2 as a political battlefield.

Here’s the thing: as far as I know, there is only one country in the world that recorrently blames China of concealing the origin of the SARS-Cov2 virus, for the further spread of the virus, and that is the US, the country of a denialist ex-president, of a denialist party- the GOP has also been in denial about the coronavirus - and where half of the adult population is denialist.
All that matters is to find out what China might have done wrong. However,they (trumpist America and conservatives) were never particularly interested in containing the epidemic- but they were always extremely keen to point the finger at China, and that includes you.
That said, Biden will attempt to prevent future pandemics by launching a National Center for Epidemic Forecasting and Outbreak Analytics in the US. WHO’s reforms won’t come until the Assembly in May. A very well drafted document,National Security Memorandum on United States Global to Strengthen the International COVID-19 Response and to Advance Global Health Security and Biological Preparedness...

[Lord Thesaurian]

The irrelevant spam you responded with certainly doesn’t suggest you “refrained from commenting.” You are flat out wrong, to such a disturbing extent you could have avoided with even a cursory Google search. Random statistics, interviews, and rants about Trump’s COVID performance have no bearing whatsoever on the fact that the entire global pandemic is the direct result of the same pattern of behavior inherent to the communist system in China on full display over and over and over again. There is every reason to question the WHO’s spoon fed findings given to them under supervision of the Politburo. Everyone, including the Biden Administration, understands this. The only question that remains is what sort of “patriotic” or other blindness would lead you to defend murderous totalitarians from the truth with the fervor of a Global Times editor.

[Ludicus]

The irrelevant spam

On the contrary. You don't even bother to read, how convenient.

There is every reason to question the WHO’s spoon fed findings given to them under supervision of the Politburo.

It's a shame that Biden announced that the U.S. would rejoin the "communist" WHO, isn't it?

The only question that remains is what sort of “patriotic” or other blindness would lead you to defend murderous totalitarians from the truth with the fervor of a Global Times editor.

Edit- I just said that I refuse to see the pandemic as a political battleground. That said,I can't help but wonder what it would be like if the epidemic had its start under Trump's negationist administration.

[Lord Thesaurian]

On the contrary. You don't even bother to read, how convenient.


It's a shame that Biden announced that the U.S. would rejoin the "communist" WHO, isn't it?

Edit- I just said that I refuse to see the pandemic as a political battleground. That said,I can't help but wonder what it would be like if the epidemic had its start under Trump's negationist administration.

The parties denying the existence of a coverup so far include you, and the Chinese government. Your denial is itself a regular feature of CCP propaganda in direct conflict with matters of public record. Moreover, the source I referenced pertaining to the specific timeline of the cover up includes a UK study as the basis of its findings, and an official EU report classified the narrative extolling Beijing’s handling of the virus in contrast to the US and the west as an example of CCP disinformation. More than 100 experts and government officials from around the world formally condemned the CCP coverup as “China’s Chernobyl:”

We should never forget that China’s Chernobyl moment was a self-inflicted wound. The CCP silenced Chinese doctors who wanted to warn other health professionals during the early stage of the outbreak: Dr Ai Fen can no longer appear in public after accepting a domestic media interview; her colleague Dr Li Wenliang died while fighting the virus in Wuhan. On his deathbed Dr Li famously said that "a healthy society shouldn't have only one voice."

https://www.macdonaldlaurier.ca/expe...rnobyl-moment/

[Ludicus]

Your denial is itself a regular feature of CCP propaganda in direct conflict with matters of public record.

50 years ago you would have had a brilliant career working for Salazar's censorship.
So, was there a delay releasing information? Certainly. For two weeks, the Chinese government tried to control the narrative, that's for sure.The usual in totalitarian regimes.But let’s keep in mind that it was in early January 2020 that the SARS-CoV-2 was isolated from bronchoalveolar lavage fluid samples. It’s also true that when they had the full understanding of what was happening,within 3 weeks from the identification of the virus, the government ordered the lockdown of more than 50 million people, an herculean task. So, I quote again the COVID Textbook, last edition,

However, within 3 weeks from the identification of the new virus, the government ordered the lockdown of more than 50 million people in Wuhan and the surrounding province of Hubei, as well as strict quarantine measures and travel restrictions for hundreds of millions of Chinese citizens. This astonishing first in human history achieved what even specialists did not dare to dream: curbing an epidemic caused by a highly contagious virus

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In America now, what’s really at stake? Legio, ask the dead, ask them whom they blame.
America's half a million Covid deaths a stark reminder

Donald Trump had wrongly claimed would simply disappear

Its an easy answer. Blame Trump, the GOP, and the widespread Covid denial:"Masks are for cowards", etc...ad nausea.
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Edit. From the news,

“I’m interested in getting all the facts,” Biden said when asked by a reporter if he has “any interest in punishing China for not being truthful about COVID last year.”

Legio, ask Biden to read your posts. That's all he needs. What is he waiting for?
---

Let's go back to the topic. Published two days ago,
I was on the WHO's Covid mission to China, here's what we found The Guardian

No, it didn’t originate in Wuhan’s wet market, but it could have been spread by frozen food. Here is what we learned from Phase 1 of the investigation

As I write, I am in hotel quarantine in Sydney, after returning from Wuhan, China. There, I was the Australian representative on the international World Health Organization’s (WHO) investigation into the origins of the Sars-CoV-2 virus.
Much has been said of the politics surrounding the mission to investigate the viral origins of Covid-19. So it’s easy to forget that behind these investigations are real people.
(...) We talked to our Chinese counterparts – scientists, epidemiologists, doctors – over the four weeks the WHO mission was in China. We were in meetings with them for up to 15 hours a day, so we became colleagues, even friends. This allowed us to build respect and trust in a way you couldn’t necessarily do via Zoom or email.

This is what we learned about the origins of SARS-CoV-2.
While viruses do escape from laboratories, this is rare. So we concluded it was extremely unlikely this had happened in Wuhan.
There’s also genetic evidence generated during the mission for a transmission cluster there as viral sequences from several of the market cases were identical. However, there was some diversity in other viral sequences, implying other unknown or unsampled chains of transmission.
A summary of modelling studies of the time to the most recent common ancestor of Sars-CoV-2 sequences estimated the start of the pandemic between mid-November and early December. There are also publications suggesting Sars-CoV-2 circulation in various countries earlier than the first case in Wuhan, although these require confirmation.
The market in Wuhan, in the end, was more of an amplifying event rather than necessarily a true ground zero. So we need to look elsewhere for the viral origins.

Frozen or refrigerated food not ruled out in the spread
Then there was the “cold chain” hypothesis. This is the idea the virus might have originated from elsewhere via the farming, catching, processing, transporting, refrigeration or freezing of food. Was that food ice-cream, fish, wildlife meat? We don’t know. It’s unproven that this triggered the origin of the virus itself. But to what extent did it contribute to its spread? Again, we don’t know.
Several “cold chain” products present in the Wuhan market were not tested for the virus. Environmental sampling in the market showed viral surface contamination. This may indicate the introduction of Sars-CoV-2 through infected people, or contaminated animal products and “cold chain” products. Investigation of “cold chain” products and virus survival at low temperatures is still under way.
Extremely unlikely the virus escaped from a lab
The most politically sensitive option we looked at was the virus escaping from a laboratory. We concluded this was extremely unlikely.
We visited the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which is an impressive research facility, and looks to be run well, with due regard to staff health.

We spoke to the scientists there. We heard that scientists’ blood samples, which are routinely taken and stored, were tested for signs they had been infected. No evidence of antibodies to the coronavirus was found. We looked at their biosecurity audits. No evidence.
We looked at the closest virus to Sars-CoV-2 they were working on – the virus RaTG13 – which had been detected in caves in southern China where some miners had died seven years previously.
But all the scientists had was a genetic sequence for this virus. They hadn’t managed to grow it in culture. While viruses certainly do escape from laboratories, this is rare. So we concluded it was extremely unlikely this had happened in Wuhan.

A team of investigators
When I say “we”, the mission was a joint exercise between the WHO and the Chinese health commission. In all, there were 17 Chinese and 10 international experts, plus seven other experts and support staff from various agencies. We looked at the clinical epidemiology (how Covid-19 spread among people), the molecular epidemiology (the genetic makeup of the virus and its spread), and the role of animals and the environment.
The clinical epidemiology group alone looked at China’s records of 76,000 episodes from more than 200 institutions of anything that could have resembled Covid-19 – such as influenza-like illnesses, pneumonia and other respiratory illnesses. They found no clear evidence of substantial circulation of Covid-19 in Wuhan during the latter part of 2019 before the first case.

Where to now?
Our mission to China was only phase 1. We are due to publish our official report in the coming weeks. Investigators will also look further afield for data, to investigate evidence the virus was circulating in Europe, for instance, earlier in 2019. Investigators will continue to test wildlife and other animals in the region for signs of the virus. And we’ll continue to learn from our experiences to improve how we investigate the next pandemic.
Irrespective of the origins of the virus, individual people with the disease are at the beginning of the epidemiology data points, sequences and numbers. The long-term physical and psychological effects – the tragedy and anxiety – will be felt in Wuhan, and elsewhere, for decades to come.
This was first published in the Conversation

[Lord Thesaurian]

The CCP coverup is the direct cause of the global pandemic. The Biden Admin has questioned the WHO’s findings pending further verification from other sources. These are facts. I don’t know why you would insist on disputing them in defense of the totalitarian communist government that caused this whole mess, but your argument contradicts not just American findings, but European and global reports and declarations on the subject as well.

Chinese policy makers have been floating an implausible theory: The novel coronavirus didn’t originate in China but was imported from Europe. That’s what a former chief epidemiologist of the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention told an academic conference last fall. One theory is the virus rode into Wuhan on frozen-food packaging.

This month the World Health Organization visited China to investigate the origins of the virus. A member of the WHO delegation said it's “possible that a frozen carcass could have been shipped” to China and introduced the virus, giving some validation to the food-packaging idea. Reporting has suggested that China required the WHO to agree it would investigate the food hypothesis as a condition of entering Wuhan. By lending credence to this improbable theory, WHO is damaging trust in the important project of figuring out where the virus originated.

To its credit, the Biden administration has said it will reject the WHO findings absent independent verification. “The Chinese, at least heretofore, have not offered the requisite transparency that we need,” State Department Spokesman Ned Price said earlier this month. “We will work with our partners, and also draw on information collected and analyzed by our own intelligence community,” rather than “rush to conclusions that may be motivated by anything other than science.”

The WHO team said the lab-escape theory is so remote that it doesn’t merit any further investigation. But frozen salmon does? By giving weight to the food theory, the WHO is making itself less credible, which is a pity. The WHO provides important public-health functions, especially in low- and middle-income nations, where its assistance saves lives. Its work is essential. But the WHO risks eroding its standing and mission if it trades rigor for access and the pretense of relevancy.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/who-sai...an-11613933182

[Cyclops]

...
Let's go back to the topic. Published two days ago,
I was on the WHO's Covid mission to China, here's what we found The Guardian

Thanks, this is interesting and relevant stuff. Now that the Trump simps have (mostly) stopped shrieking the scientific side can be discussed sensibly.

The lab origin is unlikely but possible. We are deeply involved with China economically so the idiot "Chyna" narrative may get dumb redneck votes but outside the airless US political club penguin its unhelpful nonsense.

China has the been the source for waves of interesting viruses and the preconditions still exist; they cannot catch them all before they get out and countries like the US and the UK are simply unable to cope for a variety of reasons.

[sumskilz]

Regarding Dominic Dwyer's opinion piece:

We spoke to the scientists there. We heard that scientists’ blood samples, which are routinely taken and stored, were tested for signs they had been infected. No evidence of antibodies to the coronavirus was found. We looked at their biosecurity audits. No evidence.

Phrases like "we spoke to" and "we heard that" aren't going to satisfy anyone calling for an independent investigation.

Likewise:

We looked at the closest virus to Sars-CoV-2 they were working on – the virus RaTG13 – which had been detected in caves in southern China where some miners had died seven years previously.

But all the scientists had was a genetic sequence for this virus. They hadn’t managed to grow it in culture.

In other words, they didn't actually look at the closest virus to Sars-CoV-2 that the WIV were working on, and they accepted a ridiculous excuse for its disapearance.

In support of the lab leak hypothesis is the fact that the virus first appeared already well-adapted to infecting people in Wuhan far away from any likely natural sources and without any identified sister or precursor clades in the population. The seemingly pre-adapted state of the virus when it was first documented could be accounted for if the virus had been pre-circulating in humans for some time and only coincidentally first appeared in Wuhan near the one lab in the country doing the exact types of experiments that would produce such a virus. If this were the case, ancestral and sister clades should appear in pre-COVID blood samples. These have not been found, at least not that anyone is willing to admit to. I say the latter, because this best alternative (and natural) explanation for the peculiarities of the virus is also something the Chinese government would want to cover up, because it could potentially indicate incompetence on their part in that they had failed to recognize the risk or that they did know but hid it from the rest of the world for much longer than is already suspected.