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Alina Chan

@Ayjchan

29 Oct

Not sure if I'm reading this document right, but it looks like there are many things we should be investigating to see if SARS-CoV-2 has natural or lab origins. nonproliferation.org/op-49-a-guide-…

Let's apply the Investigation Methodology shown in Fig 2 to the current pandemic. A natural origin has not been confirmed; no animal samples from the market or Hubei province have tested positive despite a scattering of pangolin CoV papers from Guangdong and GuangXi province.

Despite the lack of evidence for a natural origin, many experts have come out as saying that it is clear that SARS2 has completely natural origins and that lab-based scenarios are implausible. The independent investigation of lab is led by long time funder+collaborator of WIV.

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Alina Chan

@Ayjchan

26 Oct

@AlexBerenson

@AlexBerenson This is a question I've been asking as well. Where was RaTG13's data stored since 2018? Not in a public or password-restricted national database because even other Chinese groups only noticed the 99% match between SARS2 and the btCoV/4991 short sequence published in 2016 on NCBI.

@AlexBerenson

@AlexBerenson Even scientists from the State Key Lab of Virology, Wuhan didn't have access to RaTG13 data (collected 2017-2018). In their Feb 5 paper, they lamented: "the BtCoV/4991 sequence was only partial and thus no comparisons can be made for the rest of genomes." tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.10…

@AlexBerenson

@AlexBerenson Although the WIV publication that first named RaTG13 was put on bioRxiv on Jan 23, the raw data and genome sequence for RaTG13 were only deposited on a public database on Feb 13 and Mar 24, respectively. ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/MN9965…

Read 4 tweets

Alina Chan

@Ayjchan

25 Oct

Get ready. This is going to be an important thread. Election season will be over soon and hopefully more people will devote some attention to this...

I'm going to walk through a timeline of SARS2-related virus data published in the months after the outbreak. (1/30)

Since the outbreak in late 2019, events have been unfolding at such a fast pace that it is difficult to keep track of what happened and in what order.

I use visualizations of the timeline to follow key events relating to the search for the animal host of SARS2. (2/30)

Even today, I still hear people saying that SARS-CoV-2 came from pangolins and a Seafood market in Wuhan. I hope this analysis will help to clear things up. It will refresh us on significant early pandemic events and major publications discussing the origins of the virus (3/30).

Read 36 tweets

Alina Chan

@Ayjchan

23 Oct

On masks: the experts are still debating whether masks reduce infectious dose of SARS2 (and, to a certain extent, transmission).

Data suggests that mask-wearing is likely correlated with less COVID prevalence in the area.

Pro-maskers are not pushing masks because of personal pleasure from making other people wear masks indoors. I personally hate wearing masks. But people are advocating for mask-wearing because it's quite possible that it protects against transmission.

Right now, you're right, we cannot distinguish the protective effects of masks (any type) from other public health measures.

But is this the war you want to fight?
Personally, it's more important to find out where SARS2 came from. Whether there's more where it came from.

Read 10 tweets

Alina Chan

@Ayjchan

21 Oct

I need the scientists+editors who are directly or indirectly covering up severe research integrity issues surrounding some of the key SARS2-like viruses to stop and think for a bit.

If your actions obscure SARS2 origins, you're playing a hand in the deaths of millions of people.

I know it feels like your decision only impacts 1 publication or 1 genome. It's not.

Your decision helps bad actors to escape accountability and corrupt the public's knowledge on this issue.

Your decision makes this highly important research less transparent & less scientific.

If we don't fight to reduce pathogen spillovers into humans - whether natural or lab - it's a guarantee that more pathogens are coming from where SARS2 came from. People will find out some day and remember what top scientists and journals were doing to hinder investigations.

Read 29 tweets

Alina Chan

@Ayjchan

20 Oct

@MonaRahalkar

Very glad that the paper by @MonaRahalkar and @BahulikarRahul is finally published in a peer-reviewed journal. We need more scientists and journalists looking at possible links between SARS-CoV-2 origins and the 2012 Mojiang miners. frontiersin.org/articles/10.33…

I know of experts don't want to consider the miners because it is too far out of, frankly, anyone's field. But if experts don't look at the miners because it is outside their specialization, and journalists don't look at them because of the complex science, then who will?

Apparently, the answer is semi-anonymous users on twitter, who have recently named themselves DRASTIC (Decentralized Radical Autonomous Search Team Investigating COVID-19).

Their findings were described in the Sunday Times (still behind paywall) in July. thetimes.co.uk/article/seven-…

Read 14 tweets

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