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Did all this stem from a bat

118 replies

skidadle · 06/01/2021 13:40

Just that really. Did all this really stem from someone eating a bat in China

OP posts:
Fieldofyellowflowers · 06/01/2021 15:18

@TheCountessofFitzdotterel

China is now prospering while the rest of the world is on it's knees. Right at the beginning, before the virus had really spread outside of China and everyone thought that Covid was a bad case of sniffles that would blow over, a Chinese doctor tried to speak out on the severity of it. Just a few days later, he had died of 'Covid'.

A power hungry government would probably think whatever damage that was done to their country is a small price to pay in order to keep growing in strength while the rest of the world get weaker.

Chloemol · 06/01/2021 15:19

My personal opinion is that it is modified via the lab in Wuhan from bats 1000 miles away, and they were experimenting and it ‘got out’ either by accident or deliberately

Wannabangbang · 06/01/2021 15:19

And i think Donal Trump was the main instigator

Wannabangbang · 06/01/2021 15:23

Also another thing to add, China must already have mass immunised and had the vaccine long ago for their country to be how it is now. But they just hid it from the world.

TheCountessofFitzdotterel · 06/01/2021 15:29

If I was China and I was going to deliberately release a disease to destroy the rest of the world I would have released it somewhere in the world other than near the research lab that works on this kind of virus in my own country.
If western countries had reacted differently and banned flights from China immediately it appeared while getting on top of cases in our own countries more successfully (as some of China’s neighbours have) it could easily have ended up damaging them more than the rest of us.
An accidental lab release I can believe, a deliberate one by the government just doesn’t make sense.

TableFlowerss · 06/01/2021 15:33

@Bluntness100

No one knows. There is even evidence now it was in italy before it was in China.

A bit like our Kent strain, did it start in Kent or did we just find it first.

Funny you say that, one of our family members went there on holiday in summer 2019 and was really unwell for months upon return, with doctors telling her she had a virus.

I joking said could have been covid and the symptoms very much sounds like it.....

LacyEdge · 06/01/2021 15:34

I don’t believe any conspiracy theories. They’re all childish bollocks. That said — I’m convinced it was by accident rather than design, but the theory that Covid was leaked from the lab seems a far more parsimonious and elegant explanation than any other. If biosecurity was lax, it would have been an accident waiting to happen. Also explains why China are being secretive about the origins.

That doesn’t mean it was a man-made virus. I’m guessing they isolated it from wildlife and were researching ways to weaponise it. Which is what Porton Down does too, presumably, only their security is top notch. It was a colossal fuckup.

Nunoftheother · 06/01/2021 15:38

@Lonelycrab

All those people that says it was created in a lab- there was a paper published last March (featured in the guardians long read) by world leading virologists that debunked this myth.

They understand the Coronavirus family of viruses better than most in the world. They explained it was quite easy to see the evolutionary link between covid19 and previous viruses ie sars/mers etc.

They also understand the tell tale signs that a virus has been manipulated- if you are a world leader in the field you will understand this better than pretty much anyone. Those tell-tale signs are not present and they concluded that it is a natural progression for this class of virus.

I’ll believe those type of specialists- it’s been their life work studying these things, unlike most of the shite any old random spouts on the Internet. That’s my 2p.

Do you have a link to this article? (I'm not questioning the veracity, I'd just like to read it.)
Lonelycrab · 06/01/2021 15:41

I posted the link a few minutes after.

Nunoftheother · 06/01/2021 15:50

@Lonelycrab

I posted the link a few minutes after.
Sorry, I missed that. Thanks.
froggywentacarolling · 06/01/2021 15:54

It's not outside the realm of possibility that samples of the virus had been gathered from wild animals and were being studied in the lab, and accidentally got out.

The idea they (conspiracy theorists always talk about "they" but never seem to know who "they" means) released it into their own local area and their own country is simply not plausible and is the realm of YouTube conspiracy theorists. Why would a country decimate their own country, murder thousands of their own people, and decimate their own economy? And have the whole entire world blaming them for the pandemic? If there was anything remotely intentional about it, they would have simply sent someone to a rival country to release it there and it would never have been traced to or linked to China at all.

The idea that it was created in a lab has been comprehensively debunked by any number of scientists worldwide. It simply is not physically possible to engineer something artificially with there being no trace of it having been engineered. That's like taking a pile of logs and trying to craft a tree that looks like it actually grew from the ground.

It most likely did come from a wet market.

1dayatatime · 06/01/2021 15:54

@Chloemol

My personal opinion is that it is modified via the lab in Wuhan from bats 1000 miles away, and they were experimenting and it ‘got out’ either by accident or deliberately
I agree with you that it was most likely a "purified" version by the Wuhan Lab of the virus naturally occurring in bats in the caves in the district of Tongguan Yunnan Province).

This virus then escaped from the Lab due to lax controls in exactly the same way as SARS did. I do strongly believe though that this was accidental and not deliberate.

The strange thing is though that the rest of the world would be far more forgiving of the Chinese Government if they simply admitted the Lab messed up and that they will be taking action. Just as the world was forgiving on the SARS accidental release.

All this cover up and misinformation simply adds to the conspiracy theory that it was deliberate.

MillieEpple · 06/01/2021 16:03

I think they brought too many sick bats to the lab so sent the excess to market. So then it was just that zoonotic thing but with more sick bats that you'd expect in the dupply chain. So unintended consequence rather than an accidentally leaked mutation or deliberate leak..

froggywentacarolling · 06/01/2021 16:03

China must already have mass immunised and had the vaccine long ago for their country to be how it is now. But they just hid it from the world.

Please don't spread these dangerous, totally groundless conspiracy theories. It's genuinely damaging and based on zero facts or evidence.

China does not have some secret vaccine for a virus no one even knew existed two years ago. If you'd ever worked in virus research or knew even the slightest thing about how scientific research actually works, you'd know that what you're describing is physically impossible.

China is "back to normal" because they locked down immediately and locked down so tightly. (Meanwhile the British government encouraged people to eat in restaurants to help the economy, allowed a huge range of shops to stay open, had barely any enforcement of restrictions, and lots of British people flat out refused to do even basic tiny things like wear a mask.) Plus the Chinese government downplays the death rate and is probably not reporting figures accurately.

Other countries like Taiwan and South Korea have had success in containing the virus, are they supposedly in on the whole 'secret vaccine' thing too? Do the conspiracy theorists have any answer as to how a conspiracy that many millions of people would have to be in on was kept secret (the zillions of Westerners living in China prior to the pandemic just never noticed a mass government mandatory vaccine plot taking place under their very eyes? None of the Chinese journalists and citizen journalists and bloggers who have gone to prison for reporting this ever bothered to mention it?) considering how many conspiracies that only a handful of people knew about, have failed and been exposed?

Puzzledandpissedoff · 06/01/2021 16:07

Access to the lab by WHO has been denied ... this is not a conspiracy theory, but a fact

So I see - at least, if the BBC have got it right this time: www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-china-55555466

While not surprised, I'm intrigued they've refused even the WHO with whom they're reported to have such close links
Predictably, the accusations of "releasing it deliberately" are ramping up again. Call me cowardly, but I kind of wish this could never be proved - because the consequences would be unthinkable

Aprilrainbow · 06/01/2021 16:14

@Bluntness100

No one knows. There is even evidence now it was in italy before it was in China.

A bit like our Kent strain, did it start in Kent or did we just find it first.

You sound like the Chinese government, are you?
1dayatatime · 06/01/2021 16:21

@froggywentacarolling

"China is "back to normal" because they locked down immediately and locked down so tightly. "

+++++

So China with a population twenty times bigger than the UK has announced only 4,900 deaths compared to 70,000 and counting in the UK

This could because they locked down and immediately and tightly as you suggest or it might just might be because they are lying about the figures???

1dayatatime · 06/01/2021 16:27

@Aprilrainbow

"You sound like the Chinese government, are you?"

If you get a chance what is quite amusing is look at BBC newsfeed stories on Facebook on anything to with Covid and China. Then go to the comments section, then find any very pro China posts then look at the profiles of the posters.

They are so made up and recently created obviously by Chinese Gov employees. With names like Bob Smith from Kentucky who has had no previous Facebook postings.

An amusing game of spot the stooge.

1dayatatime · 06/01/2021 16:30

@Puzzledandpissedoff

"Predictably, the accusations of "releasing it deliberately" are ramping up again. Call me cowardly, but I kind of wish this could never be proved - because the consequences would be unthinkable"

Which is why the Chinese Government needs to fess up as soon as possible on their screw up before the conspiracy theorists of a deliberate release gets traction.

Aprilrainbow · 06/01/2021 16:37

[quote 1dayatatime]@Aprilrainbow

"You sound like the Chinese government, are you?"

If you get a chance what is quite amusing is look at BBC newsfeed stories on Facebook on anything to with Covid and China. Then go to the comments section, then find any very pro China posts then look at the profiles of the posters.

They are so made up and recently created obviously by Chinese Gov employees. With names like Bob Smith from Kentucky who has had no previous Facebook postings.

An amusing game of spot the stooge.
[/quote]
Unfortunately so many people take everything at face value.

orangenasturtium · 06/01/2021 16:42

@Lonelycrab

www.nature.com/articles/s41591-020-0820-9

Skip to theories of covid-sars origins. Explains it quite clearly.

That paper makes a good argument for why it is unlikely that the virus was genetically manipulated and created in a lab.

However, the 2 possible scenarios for evolution of the virus could have taken place in a lab known to have poor biosecurity as much as they could have happened in a wet market or cave.

Puzzledandpissedoff · 06/01/2021 16:42

1dayatatime whether this is a lab accident, something worse or completely unrelated, the Chinese regime will "fess up" to precisely nothing; it just doesn't work that way

I don't even imagine they appreciate this being discussed at all - though while they control their own nation's internet they've not so far managed to control everyone else's

FOJN · 06/01/2021 16:45

The Wuhan lab was a joint project with the French. Michel Barnier sign off the project in 2004 despite concerns raised about the Chinese standards of biosecurity. The French scientists who were supposed to go to the lab didn't go in the end. My money would be an accidental leak.

Given that the Chinese government manage to control much of the information we see about the country and they are denying access to the WHO it's difficult to be sure they have it entirely under control. They have a vaccination program, there is lots of on line speculation about efficacy etc but little reliable information.

LindyLou2020 · 06/01/2021 16:55

@skidadle

Just that really. Did all this really stem from someone eating a bat in China
Sometimes I think I am a lone voice in the wilderness when it comes to the origins of this virus. I'm a pretty ordinary woman who tries to get my information from what I hope are reliable sources in the media. So I'm not a politician, economist, scientist, epidemiologist, etc. The 2 main theories as to the virus's origins are 1) a wet market, or 2) a lab. What doesn't seem to be in doubt is that the Chinese government, (and I stress GOVERNMENT, not ordinary Chinese people), tried to suppress information and cover up its existence. A doctor "whistleblower" died, and others have disappeared. Now efforts are being made to impede the progress of the WHO investigation. China seems to be responsible for this pandemic, either inadvertently or deliberately - the latter being a major conspiracy theory but not without merit. I'm not advocating ill thought-out revenge, and I repeat that I'm just lay person with no expert knowledge, but given the absolute global devastation this virus has caused on peoples' lives, (and deaths), shouldn't the world be holding China accountable at some point? There doesn't seem to be any impetus for this, and I don't understand why. Is it because China is a so-called superpower, we buy so much of their stuff, and basically we are frightened of its government?
lunalucie · 06/01/2021 16:58

One thing we can agree on is that it came from China. How is another story because they are so secretive, I think it's safe to say it's been around for a lot longer than they have let on as well given samples tested in Europe have found it dated back to the end of 2019.

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