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Slack / Private Message Drop, p.281 [SLACK_000495] · slack_pm:msg:02921

Date: 2020-11-27 08:51
Type: chat message · slack
recipient: Kristian G. Andersen, Robert F. Garry, Edward C. Holmes
speaker: Andrew Rambaut

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I just had an interesting phone call from the WHO (Mark Perkin's group). Apparently with the upcoming 'investigation' into the virus origins, the Chinese are pushing the narrative that the virus started in Italy and then spread to Wuhan. Apparently it is based on some phylogenetics (presumably the shit rooting using RaTG13). I told them this was categorically a very unparsimonious explanation of the data because it would need to be an ancestral virus to Wuhan that was then not seen in Italy subsequently. And that we see the sequence of mutations appearingas the virus spreads.

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2020-11-27 07:47 Robert F. Garry open

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2011.12567.pdf "The article "The proximal origin of Sars-coV-2" (Andersen et al. 2020) is recurrently put forward as a proof for the natural origin of SARS-CoV-2. However, their reasoning does not rely onan actual positive proof of the zoonotic origin. Indeed, as discussed above, the divergence between RaTG13 and SARS-CoV-2 dates from several decades and we still don't know any suitable candidates for proximal animal hosts and viral strains. Rather, the rationale of this article consists in opposing two mutually exclusive options, which areimplicitly considered as exhaustive: either a "natural proximal origin" (i.e. a recent zoonosis), or a virus intentionallydesigned on the basis of prior knowledge, and constructed by reverse engineering (design hypothesis)." I'm losing track of the article that seek to discredit PO1. This one is particularly disingenuous. We definitely did not set up thisdichotomy.
2020-11-27 08:18 Kristian G. Andersen open

Sharing this in case there's any interest/relevance. I obviously have nothing to add... [shared file(s): Re: Wuhan market floorplan]
2020-11-27 08:51 Andrew Rambaut

I just had an interesting phone call from the WHO (Mark Perkin's group). Apparently with the upcoming 'investigation' into the virus origins, the Chinese are pushing the narrative that the virus started in Italy and then spread to Wuhan. Apparently it is based on some phylogenetics (presumably the shit rooting using RaTG13). I told them this was categorically a very unparsimonious explanation of the data because it would need to be an ancestral virus to Wuhan that was then not seen in Italy subsequently. And that we see the sequence of mutations appearingas the virus spreads.
2020-11-27 08:52 Andrew Rambaut open

Anyway - Mark and group were quite happy with the explanation I gave I think.
2020-11-27 08:59 Kristian G. Andersen open

Oh boy - if they start pushing crazy theories like that as an official narrative, then they'll lose credibility immediately. Ithink there's little reason to believe this virus did not come from somewhere in China - sure, could have beenneighboring countries, but Europe? No. Yes, I know they got a few hits for the virus in earlier samples from Italy, butI don't buy it.The rooting IS funky though... I don't think it's unreasonable that we might have had two early emergence events, one of which got massively amplified in Wuhan via early super spreading? I don't think the emergence was inWuhan - probably somewhere else with large-scale animal farming and bats around.
2020-11-27 09:03 Kristian G. Andersen open

https://twitter.com/kakape/status/1332369284186726402?s=20

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