China's C19 Liability

[Teallaura]

That's just more evidence it was deliberate. How you can have that many experiences with "accidents" and not modify your protocols efficiently enough against such accidents seems like the less likely scenario.

I'd be inclined to agree but history teaches us that it is hard to overestimate the raw incompetence of the CCP, especially when they are under pressure.

[rogue06]

I'd be inclined to agree but history teaches us that it is hard to overestimate the raw incompetence of the CCP, especially when they are under pressure.

In a country that has officially experienced 8 major bridge collapses in just the last decade there is a problem with standards. The Chicoms blame corruption which is likely a major culprit but a lot of that corruption is in the government itself.

[Sparko]

Certainly sounds like he's trying to let China off the hook. Let's suppose it's true that lab leaks happen "all the time". What doesn't happen all the time is a government covering it up and creating (probably deliberately) a situation where a deadly virus can spread around the world.

If lab leaks happen all the time, then they are doing it wrong.

[seanD]

I'd be inclined to agree but history teaches us that it is hard to overestimate the raw incompetence of the CCP, especially when they are under pressure.

The problem with the "china is incompetent theory" is that now we know how closely tied Fauci's group (Ralph Baric, Peter Daszak, et al) is to these experiments. So it's a bit difficult to put the entire onus on the CCP. We don't know how closely managed this was by the CCP at the time. But since western players are involved in this, and especially western players we idolize as scientific gods, this means the west will do everything in its power to help china cover this up. The best we'll get, like I said before, is "accidental leak," if that. Thus nothing will come of this in the way of any sort of meaningful punishment.

[Sparko]

Reminds me of the Stephen King book, 'The Stand' which starts with a flu-like virus that escapes from a lab.

If "leaks always happen" then eventually we are doomed because one day these irresponsible/careless scientists are gonna leak something that kills the world.

[seanD]

I don't think that the Chinese would deliberately release it without first having developed a vaccine for themselves.

That's Basic Villainy 101

Villainy 101, develop a vaccine with the genetic sequence of the virus at least a month (or perhaps much earlier?) in advance before it's released to the public as a head start.

If we're considering the timeline and its implications, Zhou died three months after filing a Feb. 24, 2020 patent application for a COVID-19 vaccine. While this could mean that he was working on a COVID-19 vaccine before the virus became public knowledge in December 2019, keep in mind that Moderna was able to design the sequence for their COVID-19 vaccine just two days after Chinese officials released its genetic sequence on Jan. 11, 2020 - filing for their first related patent in March, two months later.

Also note that Zhou had been working on coronavirus vaccines since at least 2006 in response the original SARS-CoV outbreakit implies that China withheld the genetic sequence for a month before its Jan. 11 public release. Or, Zhou may have had more of a 'head start' than that.

"," said Nikolai Petrovsky from Flinders University.

(...)

So what do we now know?

• China's militarywas in fact involved at the Wuhan lab. It was not just a civilian operation. This, by the way, has been repeatedly denied over the last year and change.

• The lab's scientists knew not only the sequencing of the virus but in addition had a patentable way to create an alleged vaccine before the pandemic was public. It takes time to draft patents and figure them out. Quite a lot of time, in fact -- not a couple weeks or months.

• It takes time to prove up patent material, including in the case of a vaccine. To patent something you must be able to demonstrate it; you cannot patent ideas, only embodiments of ideas. In that case you would have to prove immunogenicity which isn't instantaneous; it takes weeks or even months to get through original science on this with animals and then humans, which means the date of knowledge was not February 24th it was months or even further before that.
• That means they were working on this even before that time because to work on a vaccine you have to know you must or would want to work on it in the first place. This in turn means they knew damn well there was a virulent virus in the wild prior to that date, or they released it or intended to release it into the wild on purpose. Nobody comes up with a vaccine for a virus you intend to and have confined entirely within a laboratory in animal or cell culture testing; that's worthless. Without an isolate to create a vaccine for and a virus outside of a lab environment where vaccination becomes a "thing" that might be required and thus have value why would you do the work to create one?

What's the timeline on all this? Many, many months or even a couple of years.

That means either the virus was "out" for many months to a couple of years before February of 2020 (not a month or two) or the Chinese intended to release it in the fall of 2019. In either case the evidence is now overwhelming that this was not a virus that "magically appeared" one fine day in late December having come naturally from bats and perhaps pangolins. That is not just improbable anymore -- it is now, on the manifest weight of the evidence, impossible.

[rogue06]

Villainy 101, develop a vaccine with the genetic sequence of the virus at least a month (or perhaps much earlier?) in advance before it's released to the public as a head start.

And fiendishly held onto it as it ravaged their own people, then finally releasing it months later. Yeah that sounds plausible.

[Sparko]

And fiendishly held onto it as it ravaged their own people, then finally releasing it months later. Yeah that sounds plausible.

What kind a villain wouldn't do that?

[rogue06]

What kind a villain wouldn't do that?

One that wants to make sure that they come out on top. One that wants to make sure they inflicted far more damage than they suffered.

[Sparko]

One that wants to make sure that they come out on top. One that wants to make sure they inflicted far more damage than they suffered.

A true villain wouldn't have a soft spot for local people.

[rogue06]

A true villain wouldn't have a soft spot for local people.

Nothing to do with having a "soft spot." It has to do with decimating your side. The folks already working for you. Filling your armies and factories. It would be sort of like dropping nukes on your enemies as well as your side.

[Sparko]

Nothing to do with having a "soft spot." It has to do with decimating your side. The folks already working for you. Filling your armies and factories. It would be sort of like dropping nukes on your enemies as well as your side.

The Chinese government has already shown over and over they don't care about their own people. They are merely expendable pawns and slaves to the communist machine. A few thousand dead is nothing to them.

[rogue06]

The Chinese government has already shown over and over they don't care about their own people. They are merely expendable pawns and slaves to the communist machine. A few thousand dead is nothing to them.

Y'all have just seen waaay too many movies where the villain indiscriminately kills their minions and followers just because they can. You know what happens IRL when that happens? You either wake up one day all alone having been abandoned by everyone, or those you treat as disposable like that decide to eliminate you.

History is full of dictators and tyrants deposed of by their friends, family, "loyal bodyguards" etc. when those in such groups realize that their leader's continual existence means a shortened lifespan for them.

[Cerebrum123]

Y'all have just seen waaay too many movies where the villain indiscriminately kills their minions and followers just because they can. You know what happens IRL when that happens? You either wake up one day all alone having been abandoned by everyone, or those you treat as disposable like that decide to eliminate you.

History is full of dictators and tyrants deposed of by their friends, family, "loyal bodyguards" etc. when those in such groups realize that their leader's continual existence means a shortened lifespan for them.

And you think this kind of thing can't or won't happen now, why exactly?

[seanD]

And fiendishly held onto it as it ravaged their own people, then finally releasing it months later. Yeah that sounds plausible.

Distributing it to their citizens before anyone else in the world had it. What would that look like?

Bro, you're just arguing against this now for the sake of arguing. I'm going to assume it's just a pride thing -- "I don't want to admit I was wrong."