Slack / Private Message Drop — page 667

Thank god for the South China Morning Post: https://www.scmp.com/comment/opinion/article/3127858/let-science-decide-origins-covid-19 [2021-03-31 16:18:56] [Kristian Andersen] Good for them - WSJ should read this... "The theory needs to be laid to rest lest it distracts from scientific tracking of the virus" :clap: [2021-03-31 16:21:15] [Kristian Andersen] It's :point_down: all over again, which I said in reply to Amy. _I think a lot of people don't (or don't want to) really understand how the WHO works or its mandate. There is so much focus on "WE MUST GO IN TO FULLY INVESTIGATE WIV!", while the more important study is a collaborative endeavor, focusing on the more likely scenarios._ I don't think the likes of Jesse understand this. Any of it. [2021-03-31 16:26:21] [Eddie Holmes] Yes, totally agree. Clearly, a lot of the people who are currently mouthing off are failing to understand these basic points. [2021-03-31 16:37:05] [Kristian Andersen] Yeah, especially the kind of attitude from Rasmus. Not a peep for weeks and then this is all you post about the report? Fuck off. It's fine that you disagree on the conclusions and we can argue the science / data, but an attitude like this is just terrible behavior. [shared file(s): Screen Shot 2021-03-30 at 10.56.58 AM.png] [2021-03-31 16:55:46] [Eddie Holmes] He's totally out of his depth on this. [2021-03-31 18:20:02] [Eddie Holmes] The WIV claim that (i) all their staff were PCR/antibody negative to SARS-CoV-2 and (ii) that they don't have a virus more closely related to SARS-CoV-2 than RaTG13. If those two facts are true then the WIV cannot be the source of SARS-CoV-2. If these facts are not true then the scientists at WIV are lying. It's as simple as that. And it's not just the Chinese govt that are misleading as Pompeo rants, but scientists at WIV who publish in top journals. [2021-03-31 18:49:00] [Robert Garry] *"It's as simple as that."* Could not agree more! Before the freaking pandemic they would have had zero motive to lie. On the contrary they would have had every incentive to publish ASAP on a new novel betacov related to SARS-CoV-1. [2021-03-31 18:50:36] [Eddie Holmes] Exactly!! [2021-03-31 19:00:15] [Kristian Andersen] Yup. And it's not just scientists at the WIV that would have to be lying - it's a whooooole lot of other people too. Also key - "that they don't have a virus more closely related to SARS-CoV-2 than RaTG13" - it's not even that - they don't even have _that_ virus, only the sequence. When we started looking into this there was no intel and hence it was more than appropriate to consider a lab leak a