“We are not just battling the virus, but also conspiracy theories,†a spokesman for the Wuhan Institute of Virology has said. “Conspiracy theories do nothing but create fear, rumors, and prejudice.â€
He was trying to squash an idea that has been growing in popularity ever since the 2019-nCoV Coronavirus outbreak began: that his Virology Lab, at the heart of Wuhan, might be responsible.
In a way, he was right. In a time of crisis, the last thing anyone would want to do is spread fear — especially if it’s based on nothing but a baseless rumor.
But when you start looking into those claims that the epidemic that’s already infected almost 250,000 people across the world started in a Wuhan Virology Lab, it starts looking like something other than a conspiracy theory. It starts looking like an explanation that holds up unnervingly well — and that, if we take the time to look into it, could help prevent something similar from happening again.
The official story is that 2019-nCoV started in a seafood market in Wuhan. Unclean animals sold there were carrying the virus, Chinese scientists have suggested, and, as a result, some unlucky shoppers ended up becoming patient zeros for a global crisis.
You’ve probably already heard that explanation before, and there’s a good chance you’ve accepted it as a fact — but there are some glaring problems with it.
For one thing, the first patients with 2019-nCoV have no connection to the market whatsoever. They lived nearby, and they appear to have spread the disease to people who went there — but the real patient zeros never actually stepped foot inside of it.
Also, 2019-nCoV is believed to have originated in bats — and this was a seafood market. Nobody was selling bats inside of this market. Bats just aren’t something people in Wuhan normally eat.
Even China’s scientists have started backing away from this theory. To quote one directly:
“It seems clear that [the] seafood market is not the only origin of the virus… But to be honest, we still do not know where the virus came from.â€
A lot of people have pointed to the Wuhan Institute of Virology, which is just a 30 minutes drive for the seafood market. But if that’s not close enough for you, there’s another lab that researches bat coronaviruses that’s even closer: The Wuhan Center for Disease Control & Prevention.
It’s not just on the other side of town. It’s on the other side of the street.
23 Mar 2020
Seattle Sam
Occam’s Razor
Mike-SMO
How does one say “Oops” in Mandarin?
You know that they will never let you find ouit, just ‘cuz. Admitting an error would probably be worse than saying it was intentional.
Look on the bright side. The downed Ukrainian airliner may have made the Iranians think twice about lighting the big fuse. IRGC talks big but is probably on a competence level with CDC/FDA. IRGC can stick to raping demonstrators (the ones they don’t shoot in the street.) and the CDC can refine their paper shuffling skills and enjoy “chubby chasing”.
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