Talk:COVID-19 lab leak theory: Difference between revisions

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I've only read the lead so far and since the last sentence contradicted the mainstream zoonotic view, suggesting that only some scientists consider the lab leak scenario less likely, I checked the cited source. It doesn't support the sentence, in fact it reminds readers of The Lancet's conclusion that "the evidence to date supports the view that Sars-Cov-2 is a naturally occurring virus rather than the result of laboratory creation and release" and that the idea was mostly pushed by conspiracy theorists, although it of course remains part of scientific investigations.^[1] —PaleoNeonate – 02:26, 13 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

You are right and that sentence in the lede is something I need to work on in order to ready this draft for review. I thought that the Telegraph source was worth including as it is the only known public statement by Peter Daszak, who is on record as saying that the "the idea that this virus escaped from a lab is just pure baloney", and remains one the most vocal critics of the theory. In an interview with the BBC, Daszak was asked if would seek access to the Wuhan lab to rule the lab-leak theory out, and he answered that it was "not his job" to do that. Ever since Ralph Baric got FOIA'ed, there has been some controversy around the Lancet letter, as it was revealed that Daszak is its author, and it doesn't represent a majority position of scientists. Both Ralph Barric and Linfa Wang, two of Peter Daszak and Shi Zhengli's closest research partners have removed their signatures from the letter. Zhengli's research was focused more on rodent viruses and didn't even get into bats before she partnered with Daszak and Baric (with NIH funds), and her Wikipedia biography hardly notes her main body of work prior to 2013.

Other than that sentence in the lead, I think we should also create a new section on opposing views, but that's where it gets complicated as most of the opposing scientists focus on disproving the theory that SARS-COV-19 is a synthetic or chimeric virus that was created in a laboratory as a bioweapon, which is not what we are claiming here, and has (hopefully) been made clear in the lede. What makes this complicated is that other scientists have also said that it cannot be ruled out that SARS-COV-2 isn't anthropogenic in some way, and Ralph Baric, who is undoubtedly one of the world’s leading experts in the construction of synthetic viruses (who has said he doesn't think the lab leak scenario is likely, but possible), is on record in an interview with RIA as saying that when using assembly methods recently developed, one could "build a virus that is completely indistinguishable from a natural one".

The methods that Baric was referring to in that interview are known as "seamless cloning", such as Gibson assembly, Golden Gate Cloning, and I don't think it's in the scope of this article to go into whether the virus may or not may not have been engineered, and with these methods, as even if they were, it isn't nefarious in any way, as risky as they may be, scientists create chimeric viruses all the time, and not as bioweapons for governments, but to further their own research objectives for public health.

ScrupulousScribe (talk) 02:00, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Peter Daszak’s propaganda doesn’t qualify as reliable, especially in the publication that shamefully published since-retracted SurgiSphere papers that were also used to push a narrative that has been discredited, especially when there’s a massive patent-pharma conflict of interest financially behind them.

What it is good for is disqualifying its own strawman. --50.201.195.170 (talk) 14:03, 16 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

PaleoNeonate, I was just wondering why you tagged the Washington Post as an unreliable source? That particular article was published by the Washington Post's own editorial board as part of the The Post's View section, not a guest blogger post. The Post published another article on the topic more recently, which I would like to include too. ScrupulousScribe (talk) 02:22, 14 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Then it could be attributed to its author(s) as an op-ed, but cannot be used to make fact statements in Wikipedia's voice. —PaleoNeonate – 12:00, 15 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

🛑 And you tell me, don’t don’t use bullshit tags, hypocrite (sort of)! Again dude,

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You coming to my talk page to tell me I can’t use it is harassment. You should know better than to make strawman arguments--50.201.195.170 (talk) 13:49, 16 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If that is addressed to me and is related to this, I gently explained why it was out of context. Your accusation is also inappropriate. You'd have a hard time convincing administrators that my single friendly post at your talk page is harassment, but WP:ANI is there. —PaleoNeonate – 20:30, 20 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This is an area I'm not at all familiar with, but I'd recommend not deviating from the official line too much here. This is a fascinating theory and one that may very well in the future be vindicated, but for now it remains in the realm of pseudoscience. Sorry I can't help further, and keep up the good work. Daedalus 96 (talk) 19:21, 18 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

it's not a theory, it's a hypothesis, hence the name. Hypotheses are the stuff of science, and your confusion about this shows you are not qualified to make a judgement about what is pseudoscience. 2603:8001:9500:9E98:0:0:0:9A7 (talk) 07:35, 22 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Considering the other article Investigations into the origin of COVID-19 that currently enjoys more scrutiny for being in mainspace, this draft becomes a WP:POVFORK of both that article as well as of Misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic... —PaleoNeonate – 19:26, 20 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If we are to have an article on Investigations into the origin of COVID-19, then this would be an WP:UNDUE offshoot of it at best; even if its content were fine and its sourcing were up to spec, it'd be an obvious candidate for merging. XOR'easter (talk) 20:56, 20 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I agree that the contents of this article could be incorporated into the Investigations into the origin of COVID-19 article by editors such as Forich, Normchou and Arcturus, or any others with an interest in the topic. It would have been hard to get this draft approved, as the discussions around WP:SYNTH and WP:NOTSYNTH would have been quite contentious, as with this topic on other pages.

Boing!_said_Zebedee, please can you delete this draft, if other editors also agree? Thanks.

ScrupulousScribe (talk) 10:39, 22 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Disagreeeeeeee. Want to be able to access the source[s], and contribution history. I'll copy it to my userspace for now, as I don't expect my request to be accepted, but if it is, I'll speedy my copy.--50.201.195.170 (talk) 09:30, 23 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The article can be left to expire (WP:G13) or could be nominated at WP:MFD, another option would be redirecting it to a mainspace article. —PaleoNeonate – 17:34, 25 January 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Paleo: this article should redirect to "COVID-19 misinformation." At best, an article could be created called "COVID-19 lab leak conspiracy theory." -Darouet (talk) 14:55, 10 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

@Darouet: his is a bit confusing as I technically never posted here (thanks for the ping), this was a copy and there was no history merge. I noticed the redirect and don't contest it, —PaleoNeonate – 03:39, 11 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

This article has WP:FALSEBALANCE and WP:PROFRINGE problems. Especially since a WHO official released a statement today debunking this. [1]

This article also has WP:PROSELINE problems.

The title may also be problematic. I don't know if it's correct to call a fringe theory a "hypothesis".

There's also the question of whether a fringe idea deserves its own article. Perhaps the section in COVID-19 misinformation is sufficient to cover this idea.

The bottom line is that mainstream scientists have not given this idea any credence, but the lay press has become obsessed with it, similar to how they are obsessed with ivermectin. We really need to ask ourselves if these fringe ideas deserve more than a small section in their respective parent articles. –Novem Linguae (talk) 07:18, 10 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I added material in the lead about the WHO statement. Arcturus (talk) 11:47, 10 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Who determines which scientists are to be considered mainstream? Richard Elbright, David Relman, Philip Murphy and Marc Lipsitch maintain an h-index of 70+. Rather than fringe scientists, they represent some of the most productive and impactful scientists within biology (objectively-speaking). Moreover, their respective domains are clearly relevant in regards to the question at hand. Scientific inquiry is based on falsification and not credence, but if that is the approach you wish to adopt it should be made clear at which point alternative hypotheses may be considered. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.144.251.103 (talk) 12:54, 10 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

— Preceding unsigned comment added by Arcturus (talk • contribs)

— Preceding unsigned comment added by 79.70.188.241 (talk • contribs)

Hi WhatamIdoing, since you are the original author of Wikipedia:Biomedical information it would be good to get your feedback on how you think MEDRS applies for sourcing the topic of Covid-19 origins. From what I recall of the discussion at the WP:RSN Noticeboard [131], you seemed to agree with ScrupulousScribe that MEDRS may not apply here at the moment. Other editors agreeing with that position include Guest2625, Normchou, Atsme, JPxG, Geogene, My very best wishes, Park3r, Adoring nanny and Forich. I've pinged them here in case they would like to offer an opinion again. Given that there is likely to be speculation around the lab leak hypothesis until we have some evidence for another scenario, it would perhaps be a good idea to determine how best to apply WP:PAG to this topic. Thanks, Arcturus (talk) 20:18, 8 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

Hi. Covid origin refers to many things. For example, it covers reservoir host, intermediate host, index case, animal source, early spread, zoonotic event, and genomic investigations into the common ancestor of SARS-CoV-2. Each of these origin aspects requires diffent types of expertise, ranging from bioinformatics, structural biology, molecular biology, immunology, virology, veterinary, and epidemiology. The two areas most closely related to the lab leak theory are: i) the alleged undisclosed existence of a bat swab in WIV with an at least 99.7% similarity to SARS-CoV-2 that served as backbone to SARS-CoV-2, and ii) the retrospective sampling of animals and wildlife traders in and around Wuhan to test for antibodies as evidence of an alleged long period of circulation (pre-December 2019) of SARS-CoV-2.

Sources for point i) include declarations from WIV personnel, and independent investigations into the WIV research logs. Sources for point ii) include chinese epidemiologists and veterinaries. Declarations from WIV personnel seem fishy to me (i.e. "all our research is published in journals", databases disappearing, RATG13 having a late nomenclature, Chinese governement censoring scientific papers) and regarding point ii) it appears that all chinese epidemiologists and veterinaries went on sabbatical since 2020.

I vote for using top RS (e.g. Reuters, AP, BBC, New York Times) to document these suspicions and lack of investigations, but giving them little weight in the SARS-CoV-2 or related articles. Forich (talk) 21:08, 8 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

I've created a second redirect, COVID-19 lab leak conspiracy theory, also going to COVID-19 misinformation#Wuhan lab leak story. -Darouet (talk) 14:58, 10 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

The hypothesis that the COVID19 outbreak may have originated from a lab leak is not a conspiracy theory for the following reasons:

1: Lab leaks are not uncommon events, and there is precedence for leaks having lead to outbreaks. A historical review of outbreaks of potentially pandemic pathogens by the Scientist’s Working Group on Chemical and Biologic Weapons at the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation, lists at least five laboratory leaks from nationally funded laboratories since 1966 that caused real-world outbreaks.

2: The Wuhan Lab was studying similar viruses in 2018 from samples collected from bats in southern China.

3: At said lab, they studied a version of SARS-COVID that was transmissible from bats to humans. [132].

4: This research was funded by the National Institute of Health.

5: Because a leak would have been accidental, a lab leak does not classify as a conspiracy theory.

6: The lab leak has not been disqualified as a possible source of the outbreak.

Proposed Edits Include the removal of some inflammatory language, correction of some sources cited in misleading ways, and additional links to primary sources. Original citation numbers were otherwise left unchanged.

---Start Proposed Edit---

Wuhan Lab Leak Hypothesis

One Hypothesis is that the outbreak originated by a leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The Wuhan Institute had been conducting research on viruses collected from bats in southern China.[133] Funded in part by grants from the National Institute of Health,[134] in 2018, this research included a version of SARS-CoV-2 that was transmissible to humans. At the lab, SARS-CoV-2 was also engineered for gain-of-function studies to understand cross-species transmission risk where in vivo experiments demonstrated replication of a chimeric virus in mouse lung with notable pathogenesis.[135]

While there have been at least 5 pathogenic outbreaks caused by lab leaks since 1966[136], there is no conclusive evidence yet linking the COVID19 outbreak to a lab leak. On February 9, 2021 a team probing the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic for the World Health Organization rated the lab leak theory as "extremely unlikely",[44][45][46] with the WHO mission chief saying in a subsequent interview that the hypothesis is "not impossible" and "still being discussed openly and accepted."[47]

Engineered Bio Weapon Theory

Conspiracy theories and unfounded speculation have gained popularity during the pandemic. One such narrative says the virus was engineered as a bio-weapon.[28][27][25][29] Believers are dedicated to trying to unearth "evidence" which supports the position, while attacking science which does not fit their beliefs, suggesting an ideological basis to their activities.[27]

One early source of the bio-weapon narrative was former Israeli secret service officer Dany Shoham, who gave an interview to The Washington Times about the Wuhan laboratory.[31][32] A commentary in The Epoch Times posed the question, "is the novel coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan an accident occasioned by weaponizing the virus at that [Wuhan P4 virology] lab?"[33][34] One scientist from Hong Kong, Li-Meng Yan, fled China and released a preprint stating the virus was modified in a lab rather than having a natural evolution. Peer-reviewers determined the paper "did not demonstrate sufficient scientific evidence to support its claims."[35]

US politicians began spreading the conspiracy theories, including GOP Senators Tom Cotton, Josh Hawley and Marsha Blackburn especially President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.[36][37][38][39] Many scientists and authorities debunked the theories, including NIAID director Anthony Fauci and the Five Eyes intelligence alliance.[40][41][42]

---End Proposed Edit--- — Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.11.84.173 (talk) 07:32, 21 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

 Not done The two stories are discussed in reliable sources as conspiracy theories and/or unfounded speculation. Wikipedia follows sources. Alexbrn (talk) 07:35, 21 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]

If you don't think this incredibly notable subject exist on wiki. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 07:29, 27 February 2021 (UTC)[reply]