Do you think covid started in a wet market?

[sleepyhorse]

.....Or accidentally released from a laboratory?

OMG 😂😂

Sir Ching - it's very possible they are trying to do to China what they tried to do with the Middle East, including false flag attacks.

Genuine question. What happens if it is confirmed that it came from a lab?

Would China be "punished"? How? (They are a massive supplier and also hold considerable sway, not to mention they do just ignore people's criticism? They also have appalling experiments making human and animal hybrids against the ethical protocols most countries subscribe to and we tend to look the other way and still support their business. If a fine or warning were to be issued, surely they would just ignore and/or pretend to fix it and the status quo would continue?)

How can this be prevented in future?

What does it mean for people of Chinese heritage living outside of China (ot is obviously not their fault or any Chinese person's fault outside of the government and those who were irresponsible with their lab practices, but obviously racism against these people everywhere has increased as reported by many papers and anecdotally which is not right)

There are already states taking legal action against China

But if it was released intentionally would they not release it hundreds of miles away or even in a different country. How stupid would they be to release it 8 miles from the lab that it was created? Or do you think they had a conversation and concluded that no one would notice?

If it was designed and released then they did an incredibly poor job, given the fatality rate, and the fact it hardly effects children. If I'd asked someone to design a killer virus and got this, if be asking for my money back

That entirely depends what your aim is though, surely? If It's to cause death across the board of people you consider to be "valuable" to society, you are right, it's refund time.

But anyone who released this intentionally is Cleary a psychopath. And, as such, would see elderly, vulnerable people as collateral damage.

If your aim is to terrify, cause deaths of people who "don't matter" to you, create anger towards China to whom you owe trillions (more than the lockdown of your own country costs in the short term), provide a reason to avoid paying them back, enable sanctions and possibly war against China, which boosts your own economy AND wipes out the people in your own country that cost a fortune to look after........then that's been done pretty well.

But if it was released intentionally would they not release it hundreds of miles away or even in a different country

Two hotspots - Wuhan and Hong Kong - are centres of unrest in China's direct sphere. The Hing Kong protests have all but stopped and Wuhan is now 100% under control - and total surveillance.

If it was intentionally released, I've always thought it would have been for domestic purposes rather than international ones. Otherwise they wouldnt have gone with an ACE2 focused virus. Their navy and geopolitical positioning is almost but not quite ready for direct conflict with the States, so the timing doesn't make sense for beginning a war - unless they thought it would be more deadly against the West than it has proved to be - or there is something we dont know yet, e.g. male infertility.

Whether it was an accident or a war crime intentional release, their actions upon discovery were deliberate. They hid the outbreak, then concealed the extent of it, whilst locking down domestically but keeping the international flights going, direct from the centre of infection.

Wouldnt want to be the only fucked country, would they?

@Rebelwithallthecause legal action against China in what way? Someone in the us is trying to sue China. Even if they won the suit, China is not liable for a lawsuit against them in another country. That’s not the way the law works.

SirChing

Or, it kills more men in a country with a demographic excess of men and the social issues which accompany that. 🤷‍♀️

It really doesn't suit Trump's needs to spend a fortune on public health and shut down their entire economy.

China however, has social unrest to crush and the authoritarian means to dampen the virus with harsh surveillance - something impossible in the "rule by consent" West.

And as if Xi Jinping isn't a psychopath. Look at what is happening in Xinjiang as well as what was happening in Wuhan/Hong Kong, pre virus.

As if.

But I still think it's more likely they ineptly fucked up.

Very interesting article:

www.scientificamerican.com/article/how-chinas-bat-woman-hunted-down-viruses-from-sars-to-the-new-coronavirus1/

Hunting out bats from miles away to get samples of coronavirus then studying them in Wuhan. A virus naturally found in bats but accidentally released from the lab is my guess.

The utter irony of going off to dig out hazardous viruses in order to study them with the aim of offering future protection from an outbreak...

But couldn't the international criminal court prosecute China for crimes against humanity if the virus was released on purpose by their government?

Released. Intentionally or not who knows

I dont know one way or the other.

But this thread has been very interesting to read, as I respect mumsnet posters as they are intelligent and qualified.

Its drawing together many things.
Are we to be monitored now too?
Are we sitting ducks, nice and compliant?
Is big pharma rubbing its thighs at the revenue from vaccines? Or is that a paranoid question?
The US election theories; christ.

Personally I think that the world is now one place and all our rough edges need to be shorn off as we all try to live fairly with one another. But I'm a cooperative type and I think others aren't.

Released from a lab, either accidentally or otherwise. A professor who worked in a Wuhan lab was interviewed on radio 4 the other day (can't remember his name, sorry).

He told the programme the lab had been researching viruses. He has also tried to contact the people who he worked with and can't get in touch. He assumes they are dead

I know the virus is new but it certainly doesn't seem to behave like other viruses. For example, people get cold viruses all the time, however, the numbers of deaths from it are nothing like CV and we don't all have to avoid contact for weeks on end. Even when SARS and ebola started, it was nothing like on the scale of CV. Something just doesn't add up.

I think China will have some explaining to do, although how it will be done I don't know because we rely on them so much.

@Antibles thanks for the link to that article - really interesting.

I’m not sure. America has confirmed it is neither man made or manipulated, so it is plausible in both scenarios, poor safety practices in the lab or someone ate a bat infected animal from the market, they think likely a pengolin which is used in Chinese medicine.

As scientists are pretty sure a middle animal was involved, then I’d say that it is more likely it was the market. There is a huge under ground market in pangolin, and they were sold at the market, the scales are used in Chinese medicine and the animal often eaten, it is illegal, hence why the under ground market.

Due to the middle animal requirement, it does seem more likely it was the market.

My own thoughts is due to the poor health and safety in some poorer areas of China, then it was only a matter of time until something like this happened.

I’d also add, the focus on an accidental release from the lab concerns me, fine if it’s true, but if it’s not, then it’s a big issue, because fixing some poor health and safety practices in the lab is a significantly easier problem to solve, than changing the food chain practices across China.

If this came out of the food chain, that’s a much much bigger problem to solve and keep solved. And will continue to pose a risk globally until it is.

If it’s an accidental lab release issue, then even I could go fix it in a day.

In that Netflix series in pandemics (documentary), the international teams were definitely in bat caves swabbing for new viruses to study. So I think virologists do do this as the recent novel viruses have been from animal crossovers.

If they shut the wet markets, they will just go underground. They are a source of food and income for too many people - like the bush meat markets in Africa.

And as if Xi Jinping isn't a psychopath

As if there is only one psychopathic international leader? As if

Yes. Xi Ping isn't responsible for covid shooting out of control in the US, Brazil or even the UK, who should have realised the danger at least a month before measures were finally taken, and reluctantly, I will add.

Most large cities have labs in them.

They do, I agree. But the one in question is one of only 50 BSL4 labs in the world, which is the highest safety level as I understand it. So to my mind, that makes their facility not exactly run of the mill. I take your point re: MERS/Middle East etc though. That does make sense.

Personally I think that the world is now one place and all our rough edges need to be shorn off as we all try to live fairly with one another.

I really love that sentiment and the way it's expressed.

I think it originated in the lab in Wuhan, whether it was accidentally or deliberately released.

My own thoughts is due to the poor health and safety in some poorer areas of China, then it was only a matter of time until something like this happened.

That's so true, and much more likely to be how this pandemic originated than a laboratory mistake. And if the poor health and safety practices continue, then this will happen again at some point in the future.

As if there is only one psychopathic international leader? As if

That's precisely my point dear.
And one of those leaders is considerably closer to Wuhan and with considerably more to gain (and less to lose) from the intentional release you seemingly attribute to the USA.

I still think that the Chinese state lab were inept and fucked up. It fits.