I don’t think so. Not that I believe it’s impossible it originated in China from a lab accident, I think you should have proof before claiming that but okay. But when people started claiming it came from China they weren’t doing so off of hard evidence or being rational. They were doing so because of xenophobia and nationalist pride and it’s just easier to blame these problems on an other than it is to believe shit happens.
Now this year there have been more scientific minded people who have proposed a pretty rational set of circumstances that it could have came from China, but
1. These circumstances are not proven and are little more than a hunch of what could be, and
2. The type of people who push the “Chinavirus” rhetoric aren’t those same scientific minds thinking rationally and instead they’ve had their opinion slightly verified by more recent understanding (again, slightly, because there is no proof.)
> I'm curious why Dr. Collins believes so strongly that a lab leak was unlikely, that is his reasoning, given that he states SARS had leaked on at least a couple different occasions resulting in some deaths, yet was quickly contained. The non-answer to this question, or his reference to an investigation into the intermediary, which he admits has not yet been found and will take much time, are insufficient to address the elephant in the room. It's frustrating hearing "trust the experts and bureaucracy" when throughout the interview so many instances of incompetence and failure exist in history. The question needs to be asked regarding gain of function and yet Mr. Collins is more concerned about the reputation of the scientific community. Both are important, but how can we have a public conversation without probing Senators like Rand Paul? "Public" conversations within the scientific community are referenced by Dr. Collins as well as the achievements of the Human Genome Project, but I don't understand how he can be so defensive of public figures' reputations. Again, how are we to have conversations and trust when the bureaucrats and scientific community don't communicate answers to these huge problems! Excuse us, Mr. Collins, but we just had a major pandemic and this current version of SARS was not contained and you can say you wish China were more forthcoming, but perhaps those three instances of gain of function research in the flu versus your woeful insufficient in my opinion defense of a natural gain of function and leak in the case of SARS covid-2, at least deserves some respectful, humble conversation. Labeling Senators as playing politics is not helpful since, in regards to Dr. Paul, what alternative to asking questions do you propose to serve the public interest? (This is coming from someone who read Dr. Collins book "DNA The Language of Life" having enjoyed this book as one of the best on the topic of science and faith.)
I am sure the Director of NIH didn't get to this position with incompetence. Good men are being turned into a hot mess. I would still trust NIH but they really need to clean up. I want to hold CDC and NIH more accountable than say some lunatic saying "China virus" on Parlor.
> I'm curious why Dr. Collins believes so strongly that a lab leak was unlikely, that is his reasoning, given that he states SARS had leaked on at least a couple different occasions resulting in some deaths, yet was quickly contained.
“A known, widely researched pathogen was present in a lab” and “a brand new, unknown pathogen was present in a lab” are vastly different scenarios.
Coronavirus research has been going on for a decade at the Wuhan Lab. They sent a staff of half a dozen people to a bat cave in 2013. Dr. Zhengli was a coronavirus researcher there. See [1] for in-depth history of Wuhan Lab.
