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Engineered bat virus stirs debate over risky research

Declan Butler

2015 · Nature

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forgotpwd16
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>It's about a separate personal desire to regulate supposedly risky research. Referring to: https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2015.18787 So a paper on a lab-made coronavirus related to SARS that can infect human cells from Wuhan on topic about the origins of a coronavirus related to SARS that can infect human cells that caused the pandemic from Wuhan, is a separate personal desire? >It's about a completely different study that didn't result in any pandemic. Because after the article was published, Wuhan stopped working on this, right? Or is expected China (or any other country) publishes everything related to something delicate as this? Seriously this "rebuttal" is…
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anything but excellent. The ironic answers to good remarks makes it even worse. Sounds more like trying to evade the ~~points made~~ info given rather answering them. As for the papers, origins of pandemic and origins of virus are distinct things. So, yes, we can all agree that evidence shows that pandemic started in the market, and as virus can infect animals sold there, this points towards that virus came from animals. But genetically is there anything that can distinguish a natural from a lab-made virus?
Original comment Covid: Summary of lab-origin hypothesis
slt2021
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https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02903-x it is called Gain of Function research, when zoonotic viruses (such as bats coronavirus) are grafted with proteins (such as Spike protein and its furin cleavage motif) that make it extremely virulent to humans. Such research on coronaviruses historically has been done at labs in USA and China and considered extremely dangerous (https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2015.18787) quoting https://inference-review.com/article/thunder-out-of-china "You can manipulate [coronaviruses] in the lab pretty easily, it is the spike protein drives a lot of what happens with the coronavirus zoonotic risk. You can get the sequence, you…
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can build the protein. We worked with Ralph Baric at UNC who did this, insert into a backbone of another virus and do some work in the lab. So, you can get more predictive when you find a sequence. … The logical progression for vaccines — if you are going to develop a vaccine for SARS, people are going to use pandemic SARS, but let’s try to insert some of these [other spike genes] and get a better vaccine [72]"
Original comment Early ‘lab-grown’ Covid virus found in sample lends weight to Wuhan theory
freeflight
Neutral mention · rule
> People making that claim have said that the virus seems to be particularly effective against humans despite no intermediate forms discovered yet But such forms were already discovered back in 2015 as a result of the research that's now labeled as "GoF research", even tho it didn't actually fall under the GoF moratorium back then [0]. Imho the whole thing has a very "shooting the messenger" vibe to it; The evidence we had for this being a very real possibility of happening is now turned into the alleged cause of it actually happening. [0] https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2015.18787
Original comment The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins
slt2021
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covid may have leaked from Wuhan, but the origins of research have started in the US in UNC-Chapel Hill where there is Biosafety Level 3 high security virology lab. https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02903-x The gain of function for coronaviruses has been successful in UNC-Chapel Hill as of 2015 when other researchers raised alarms that this research is extremely dangerous and US government pulled funding out of this research. https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2015.18787 After public funding for corononavirus Gain of Function research disappeared, UNC's visiting researchers, scholars, postdocs went back to Wuhan to continue research at Virology Institute. And the rest is history.
Original comment Early ‘lab-grown’ Covid virus found in sample lends weight to Wuhan theory
freeflight
Neutral mention · rule
> It gets worse - gain of function research was banned under Obama until the ban was lifted in 2017 under Trump It was never really "banned", there was a moratorium on such research after a string of safety lapses in US laboratories, moratorium's are always only of a temporary nature [0]. The often mentioned "GoF research" involving bats with US participation and funding, didn't even fall under that moratorium [1]. > you have Fauci making the case for creating viruses in a lab Of course he would make that case, because that's a useful tool to have in research. No offense, but trying to make this out as something so binary and only bad, reminds me a lot about the more radical and clueless takes on GMO that see "All GMO as bad". [0] https://www.npr.org/sections/health-shots/2014/10/17/3570109... [1] https://www.nature.com/articles/nature.2015.18787
Original comment The lab-leak theory: inside the fight to uncover Covid-19’s origins

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