Thread by @Ayjchan

I kind of expected this day to come, but still surprised that it actually arrived.

I'm going to do a quick FAQ🧵 for the public (both scientists & non-scientists) who are just hearing about the possibility of COVID-19 / SARS-CoV-2 having emerged from lab or research activities.

Is it racist to ask whether COVID-19 emerged from a lab or from the wildlife trade in China? No.

Have racist people asked the question above? Yes.

More importantly, will people call you a racist if you ask whether COVID-19 emerged from a lab or from the wildlife trade in China?

Unfortunately, yes, it is quite likely they will call you a racist and more.

And yes, even if you're Asian, you could be called a race traitor.

If COVID-19 / SARS-CoV-2 actually emerged from research activities, does it mean that it is a bioweapon?

No.

Actually, the vast majority of pathogens that have leaked from labs worldwide are natural ones initially collected from natural hosts.

Not bioweapons. Very important.

Similar question: If COVID-19 / SARS-CoV-2 actually emerged from research activities, does it mean it was designed or created in the lab, like magic, NOT based on similar natural viruses that were collected & studied by labs?

No. Scientists don't have those awesome powers yet.

If COVID-19 actually emerged from research activities instead of a natural spillover, does that impact today's public health measures and vaccines?

No.

So today, someone tweeted at me, suggesting that if the virus actually came from a lab, then we must lock down now.

This is not true.

We're 1+ year into the pandemic now. Knowing if it came from a lab or wild animals shouldn't dictate public health strategy.

Knowing the origins of a virus is most important at the beginning of the outbreak so you can track it down - it's quite likely that the index cases may not have been in the city of detection.

If it came from a lab, that's useful to know because there could be data describing it.

Knowing the origins of COVID-19 is also important for future outbreaks.

If we know which origins scenarios are plausible, then we can act to mitigate the risk of COVID-19 happening again - anywhere in the world, in any lab or market, any time in the future.

This is the kind of dangerous FAQ:

Will finding out that COVID-19 emerged from research activities or wildlife trade in China lead to massive geopolitical consequences?

And also more racism?

I can't predict the answer. And this is why it is so scary for some experts and scientists to venture into this territory.

It would be the first time we're dealing with the possibility of a lab escape as the world together in real time (not decades later as an academic thesis).

But what I believe is, if we do not properly investigate the origins of COVID-19 and fail to implement measures to prevent such a pandemic from occurring again, then we are doomed to repeat this accident - whether by wildlife trade, environment destruction or research activities.