“[Whether] this was a lab leak or not, it’s absolutely conceivable that the next epidemic could be started by a laboratory.”
Happy Friday! Singer-songwriter Ed Sheeran announced this week he will release the final album of his mathematics era, −, later this spring. He’s already published +, x, ÷, and =.
Come on, Ed, let’s get crazy. What about ∑, π, and √ ? Or γ, ∫, and Dx y! We just know Poisson(λ) would be nominated for a Grammy.
The Department of Energy may have only “low confidence” in its assessment that COVID-19 likely originated in a lab, but Republicans long criticized for their openness to the idea are still celebrating the agency’s conclusion—so much so, in fact, that you might think the report was accompanied by a little vial labeled “Nov. 2019 Wuhan COVID Recipe—Do Not Remove!”
“There was always enormous evidence that the Wuhan coronavirus leaked from the Wuhan lab,” asserted former Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, “I’m glad the Department of Energy recognizes this reality.” Sen. Tom Cotton—previously excoriated as a conspiracy theorist for voicing his belief that the virus originated in a lab—also took a victory lap. “The only conspiracy back in the early part of 2020 was a conspiracy of silence,” he told Fox News.
Love the Brian Kilmeade tweet! Poor Brian, does it hurt to be so stupid?
When you earn 8 figures annually, not as much as you think.
LOL! Often the looks on his face say otherwise. Money does not equal happiness always.
This newsletter, and the Iran piece yesterday, are perfect examples of why I’m grateful for TMD and my Dispatch subscription. Both are stories where I saw headlines and at the back of my head thought, “I probably need to know more about that,” and then everything I feel I need to know ends up being in the TMD newsletter. Thank you!
Thank you very much for interviewing Dr Vincent Racaniello. And also for linking to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch article questioning the claims in the Free Press. Well done, team!
Two really good Substack articles (the second one is imbedded in the first, just click on “Read More”).
Can’t remember the name of the TD subscriber that shared it earlier this week, but thought it deserved to be reposted since the subject has come up again.
https://open.substack.com/pub/yourlocalepidemiologist/p/covid-19-origin-debate?r=3ynoe&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
I’m someone who believed it was probably a zoonotic cause for the simple reason that a number of past deadly viruses have come out of China’s wet markets. Like the last SARs outbreak a decade or so ago.
But the lab leak theory sounds quite plausible as well.
I really don’t care if it came out of a lab or a wet market….China is still criminally responsible for spreading the virus.
LUK: not gonna touch this with a 10-foot pole. Had quite enough of the back and forth sniping on the issue the other day, and cannot believe that there are almost 390 additional comments at the time of this posting. Maybe it’s the framing of the questions?
I’m kind of feeling the same way. But there are some very thoughtful and knowledgeable comments on this complex issue as well.
Yeah, I ended up reading LOL. Scrolled past A LOT of them, though.
I think the lab leak hypothesis became politicized at the moment when the public health community started downplaying the idea. Influential voices on the right identified this as an angle to bash the public health people, the left leapt up to defend them, and it became another culture war totem like wearing masks. Asserting that the lab leak hypothesis is racist is a consequence of the progressive left tending to view everything through a lens of identity politics. For the right, it just became one more piece of evidence of perfidy by their opponents – kind of hard to reconcile “it’s a lab leak!” when you’re simultaneously arguing that it’s a hoax, or no big deal. Unless of course you start arguing it’s bioweapon so ineffective that it hardly hurts anybody but can be treated with anti-parasite medication.
Personally, I’d like to toss them all in a deep hole and walk away. COVID was a huge problem, and a lot of people seemed to be more committed to their tribal/pseudo-religious positions than actually trying to solve the problem.
This quote from Tolstoy would seem to have some relevance:
“I know that most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, can seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they have delighted in explaining to colleagues, which they have proudly taught to others, and which they have woven, thread by thread, into the fabric of their lives.”
If you look at the broader considerations around the lab leak theory, I actually don’t think it’s all that confusing. For Republicans, the theory plays into both their hawkishness towards China and their skepticism of the American public health bureaucracy. There’s even a line of attack they can use directly against Fauci given his potential involvement in securing funding for gain of function research.
Conversely, for Democrats the theory probably seems to them at first glance like racist Republican fearmongering (we saw this very early in COVID with Democrats calling the travel ban racist and Nancy Pelosi encouraging people to visit their local Chinatown). It also raises some very uncomfortable questions about the moral limits of scientific research and the American public health bureaucracy’s potential complicity in what would be the worst man-made disaster in human history. That’s not easy to swallow if you’ve spent the last 3 years treating “Trust The Science” as a religious creed.
I have been enjoying the more recent conservative attempts at hijacking the “trust the science” religion.
I feel that this coverage of Covid origins would have benefited from a more significant discussion of the current scientific evidence. While I don’t think anyone expects much in the way of truth from Mike Pompeo, it is surprising to include a quote about the “enormous evidence” that the virus leaked from “the Wuhan lab” without clarifying that there is not any actual public evidence that the virus leaked from a lab. There is much conjecture and theory about how it could have happened, but still no epidemiologic or other scientific evidence that would support a laboratory origin, and no evidence of SARS-CoV-2 or a likely progenitor in any lab anywhere. Instead, the best available scientific evidence supports a zoonotic origin with an epicenter at the Huanan Seafood Market (HSM). It seems like that deserved more emphasis than a passing mention and link.
To briefly summarize the current scientific evidence, the known early cases cluster around the HSM. This included cases with a known link to that market (i.e. they worked at or visited the market, or were a known close contact of someone who did) as well as the cases that do not have a known link to the market. Those unlinked cases actually have an even stronger geographic association with the market, as expected if humans were contracting infections at the market and spreading it to others in the local community surrounding the market. Live animals that could be an intermediate host were sold in the market and photographic evidence shows that they were present in the southwest corner that had the most positive environmental samples. There were two lineages of SARs-CoV-2 identified initially, and the genetic epidemiology indicates that these arose from separate spillovers into humans (i.e. one did not arise from the other after it had started spreading in humans). This means that there were at least two separate introductions into humans from sources with slightly different versions of the virus. And because most spillovers would not further propagate, there were likely more than two spillover events to yield the two lineages that successfully spread in humans in the early outbreak. This fits much better with a constant source of exposure from a group of animals in a market that are carrying different versions of the virus due to it circulating in that animal population.
The current scientific evidence all supports a zoonotic origin at the HSM. This evidence does not support a leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). That is located miles from the market across a river. There is no epidemiologic or geographic linkage of known early cases to the WIV. Lab leaks tend to actually be discovered quickly, because it is not hard to identify the epidemiologic linkage when people associated with a virology institute suddenly start developing a mysterious infection. For the WIV to be the source of the outbreak, there would need to be at least two separate “leaks” causing infections in two different lab workers with different lineages of the virus, and both would have to then travel miles across Wuhan and only cause superspreader events at or near the HSM (an unlikely site for a superspreader event) with no clustering of infections near their place of work. We may not have the evidence to be completely certain of the origin, but we do have evidence that makes zoonotic origin much more likely than a lab origin at this time. There are reasons to vary in your level of certainty based on this evidence and the actions of the Chinese government that limited the available information, but it is wrong to treat both possible origins as equally valid until we get new facts.
As stated we unfortunately do not have the evidence and full reasoning that the DOE and FBI used in their conclusions and any new or nonpublic facts they may have. However, there is some publicly released information and other reporting that provides some of this picture. This information suggests that DOE and FBI may not actually even agree about what lab the virus leaked from, and highlights the fact that the lab leak theory is not a unified theory but really a collection of multiple often mutually exclusive theories.
CNN has reported from sources that DOE’s change in position was “based in part on information about research being conducted at the Chinese Centers for Disease Control in Wuhan, China, which was studying a coronavirus variant around the time of the outbreak.” This is interesting, because the Wuhan CDC did move to a new lab that is near the HSM in late 2019. A leak from the Wuhan CDC could much better fit with described current epidemiological evidence showing a strong geographic linkage of early cases to the HSM region, particularly in comparison with the WIV which as noted was miles away. However, there are still significant issues with this. It is unclear when this new lab was actually open and if there would have been time for it to be the source of the earliest known infections and the likely timing of human infections based on genetic epidemiology. One scientist from the WCDC was involved in sampling bats in the field, but there is nothing to indicate any significant virology work done at the WCDC itself, and they certainly were not doing any kind of gain of function research. So a leak from the WCDC would be a leak of a natural virus with no kind of manipulation or gain of function research, and this would mean that the WIV being in same city as the outbreak really was just a coincidence.
The declassified ODNI summary of the intelligence assessment of Covid origins also gives us an understanding of the FBI’s reasoning. It is now confirmed that the FBI was the group with the moderate confidence for a lab leak, so it was their analysts’ case for a lab origin that is discussed in the assessment. The summary of their case for a lab origin is essentially that the WIV is known to do research on Coronaviruses and there is concern about their biosafety practices. That’s it. They even acknowledge that there is no evidence that WIV had a progenitor virus or anything similar to SARS-CoV-2 prior to the pandemic. There is no additional evidence about unknown cases linked to the WIV or explanation to fit with the current scientific evidence. The ODNI report also indicates that the mysterious hospitalized WIV workers are not confirmed or significant to the analysis. An organization whose role is investigating misdeed by humans may be predisposed to overinterpret evidence humans were possibly doing something suspicious.
I do hope we get more of the background data that the IC groups used for their conclusions, particularly if as the CNN reporting indicates there is new information about the Wuhan CDC that is relevant. Unless there is other information or nuance not captured in the ODNI summary, the FBI analysis seems pretty uncompelling. The key information that the IC could uncover that would be most valuable is any evidence that the WIV (or WCDC) had a possible progenitor virus. All of the current evidence indicates that they did not, and even a lab with no biosafety precautions and a tradition of having all their employees lick all the test tubes and petri dishes before going home each day could not leak a virus that they did not actually have at their facility.
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Love the Brian Kilmeade tweet! Poor Brian, does it hurt to be so stupid?
When you earn 8 figures annually, not as much as you think.
LOL! Often the looks on his face say otherwise. Money does not equal happiness always.
This newsletter, and the Iran piece yesterday, are perfect examples of why I’m grateful for TMD and my Dispatch subscription. Both are stories where I saw headlines and at the back of my head thought, “I probably need to know more about that,” and then everything I feel I need to know ends up being in the TMD newsletter. Thank you!
Thank you very much for interviewing Dr Vincent Racaniello. And also for linking to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch article questioning the claims in the Free Press. Well done, team!
Two really good Substack articles (the second one is imbedded in the first, just click on “Read More”).
Can’t remember the name of the TD subscriber that shared it earlier this week, but thought it deserved to be reposted since the subject has come up again.
https://open.substack.com/pub/yourlocalepidemiologist/p/covid-19-origin-debate?r=3ynoe&utm_medium=ios&utm_campaign=post
I’m someone who believed it was probably a zoonotic cause for the simple reason that a number of past deadly viruses have come out of China’s wet markets. Like the last SARs outbreak a decade or so ago.
But the lab leak theory sounds quite plausible as well.
I really don’t care if it came out of a lab or a wet market….China is still criminally responsible for spreading the virus.
LUK: not gonna touch this with a 10-foot pole. Had quite enough of the back and forth sniping on the issue the other day, and cannot believe that there are almost 390 additional comments at the time of this posting. Maybe it’s the framing of the questions?
I’m kind of feeling the same way. But there are some very thoughtful and knowledgeable comments on this complex issue as well.
Yeah, I ended up reading LOL. Scrolled past A LOT of them, though.
I think the lab leak hypothesis became politicized at the moment when the public health community started downplaying the idea. Influential voices on the right identified this as an angle to bash the public health people, the left leapt up to defend them, and it became another culture war totem like wearing masks. Asserting that the lab leak hypothesis is racist is a consequence of the progressive left tending to view everything through a lens of identity politics. For the right, it just became one more piece of evidence of perfidy by their opponents – kind of hard to reconcile “it’s a lab leak!” when you’re simultaneously arguing that it’s a hoax, or no big deal. Unless of course you start arguing it’s bioweapon so ineffective that it hardly hurts anybody but can be treated with anti-parasite medication.
Personally, I’d like to toss them all in a deep hole and walk away. COVID was a huge problem, and a lot of people seemed to be more committed to their tribal/pseudo-religious positions than actually trying to solve the problem.
This quote from Tolstoy would seem to have some relevance:
“I know that most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, can seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they have delighted in explaining to colleagues, which they have proudly taught to others, and which they have woven, thread by thread, into the fabric of their lives.”
If you look at the broader considerations around the lab leak theory, I actually don’t think it’s all that confusing. For Republicans, the theory plays into both their hawkishness towards China and their skepticism of the American public health bureaucracy. There’s even a line of attack they can use directly against Fauci given his potential involvement in securing funding for gain of function research.
Conversely, for Democrats the theory probably seems to them at first glance like racist Republican fearmongering (we saw this very early in COVID with Democrats calling the travel ban racist and Nancy Pelosi encouraging people to visit their local Chinatown). It also raises some very uncomfortable questions about the moral limits of scientific research and the American public health bureaucracy’s potential complicity in what would be the worst man-made disaster in human history. That’s not easy to swallow if you’ve spent the last 3 years treating “Trust The Science” as a religious creed.
I have been enjoying the more recent conservative attempts at hijacking the “trust the science” religion.
I feel that this coverage of Covid origins would have benefited from a more significant discussion of the current scientific evidence. While I don’t think anyone expects much in the way of truth from Mike Pompeo, it is surprising to include a quote about the “enormous evidence” that the virus leaked from “the Wuhan lab” without clarifying that there is not any actual public evidence that the virus leaked from a lab. There is much conjecture and theory about how it could have happened, but still no epidemiologic or other scientific evidence that would support a laboratory origin, and no evidence of SARS-CoV-2 or a likely progenitor in any lab anywhere. Instead, the best available scientific evidence supports a zoonotic origin with an epicenter at the Huanan Seafood Market (HSM). It seems like that deserved more emphasis than a passing mention and link.
To briefly summarize the current scientific evidence, the known early cases cluster around the HSM. This included cases with a known link to that market (i.e. they worked at or visited the market, or were a known close contact of someone who did) as well as the cases that do not have a known link to the market. Those unlinked cases actually have an even stronger geographic association with the market, as expected if humans were contracting infections at the market and spreading it to others in the local community surrounding the market. Live animals that could be an intermediate host were sold in the market and photographic evidence shows that they were present in the southwest corner that had the most positive environmental samples. There were two lineages of SARs-CoV-2 identified initially, and the genetic epidemiology indicates that these arose from separate spillovers into humans (i.e. one did not arise from the other after it had started spreading in humans). This means that there were at least two separate introductions into humans from sources with slightly different versions of the virus. And because most spillovers would not further propagate, there were likely more than two spillover events to yield the two lineages that successfully spread in humans in the early outbreak. This fits much better with a constant source of exposure from a group of animals in a market that are carrying different versions of the virus due to it circulating in that animal population.
The current scientific evidence all supports a zoonotic origin at the HSM. This evidence does not support a leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV). That is located miles from the market across a river. There is no epidemiologic or geographic linkage of known early cases to the WIV. Lab leaks tend to actually be discovered quickly, because it is not hard to identify the epidemiologic linkage when people associated with a virology institute suddenly start developing a mysterious infection. For the WIV to be the source of the outbreak, there would need to be at least two separate “leaks” causing infections in two different lab workers with different lineages of the virus, and both would have to then travel miles across Wuhan and only cause superspreader events at or near the HSM (an unlikely site for a superspreader event) with no clustering of infections near their place of work. We may not have the evidence to be completely certain of the origin, but we do have evidence that makes zoonotic origin much more likely than a lab origin at this time. There are reasons to vary in your level of certainty based on this evidence and the actions of the Chinese government that limited the available information, but it is wrong to treat both possible origins as equally valid until we get new facts.
As stated we unfortunately do not have the evidence and full reasoning that the DOE and FBI used in their conclusions and any new or nonpublic facts they may have. However, there is some publicly released information and other reporting that provides some of this picture. This information suggests that DOE and FBI may not actually even agree about what lab the virus leaked from, and highlights the fact that the lab leak theory is not a unified theory but really a collection of multiple often mutually exclusive theories.
CNN has reported from sources that DOE’s change in position was “based in part on information about research being conducted at the Chinese Centers for Disease Control in Wuhan, China, which was studying a coronavirus variant around the time of the outbreak.” This is interesting, because the Wuhan CDC did move to a new lab that is near the HSM in late 2019. A leak from the Wuhan CDC could much better fit with described current epidemiological evidence showing a strong geographic linkage of early cases to the HSM region, particularly in comparison with the WIV which as noted was miles away. However, there are still significant issues with this. It is unclear when this new lab was actually open and if there would have been time for it to be the source of the earliest known infections and the likely timing of human infections based on genetic epidemiology. One scientist from the WCDC was involved in sampling bats in the field, but there is nothing to indicate any significant virology work done at the WCDC itself, and they certainly were not doing any kind of gain of function research. So a leak from the WCDC would be a leak of a natural virus with no kind of manipulation or gain of function research, and this would mean that the WIV being in same city as the outbreak really was just a coincidence.
The declassified ODNI summary of the intelligence assessment of Covid origins also gives us an understanding of the FBI’s reasoning. It is now confirmed that the FBI was the group with the moderate confidence for a lab leak, so it was their analysts’ case for a lab origin that is discussed in the assessment. The summary of their case for a lab origin is essentially that the WIV is known to do research on Coronaviruses and there is concern about their biosafety practices. That’s it. They even acknowledge that there is no evidence that WIV had a progenitor virus or anything similar to SARS-CoV-2 prior to the pandemic. There is no additional evidence about unknown cases linked to the WIV or explanation to fit with the current scientific evidence. The ODNI report also indicates that the mysterious hospitalized WIV workers are not confirmed or significant to the analysis. An organization whose role is investigating misdeed by humans may be predisposed to overinterpret evidence humans were possibly doing something suspicious.
I do hope we get more of the background data that the IC groups used for their conclusions, particularly if as the CNN reporting indicates there is new information about the Wuhan CDC that is relevant. Unless there is other information or nuance not captured in the ODNI summary, the FBI analysis seems pretty uncompelling. The key information that the IC could uncover that would be most valuable is any evidence that the WIV (or WCDC) had a possible progenitor virus. All of the current evidence indicates that they did not, and even a lab with no biosafety precautions and a tradition of having all their employees lick all the test tubes and petri dishes before going home each day could not leak a virus that they did not actually have at their facility.