Thread by @Ayjchan

Going to do a serious thread on the new TWIV episode released today because it raises so many commonly held opinions on why #laborigins #labescape of COVID-19 was (extremely) unlikely.

Start ~27:20 min mark...
microbe.tv/twiv/twiv-734/

I'm very, very glad that TWIV gets the obvious strawman out of the way immediately.

Very few experts - I can't think of any off the top of my head - are claiming that SARS2 was completely, magically designed from no similar virus in nature.

https://twitter.com/Ayjchan/status/1371187296846888962

At the ~32:47 min mark, TWIV says "the dialogue has slowly shifted from it was made in a lab.. now it escaped.. How do we deal with that?"

I was surprised because in their June 2020 podcast, their guest says lab escape is a classic conspiracy theory.

https://twitter.com/Ayjchan/status/1373776415196332033

The guest says there's no evidence that a SARS2 precursor was being studied in the lab or that Wuhan lab employees got sick - I don't know.

TWIV hosts then asks at 33:46 if the guest believes Dr Zhengli Shi who says SARS2 wasn't in her lab...

The guest says she believes it but unclear if it could've been in a sample in lab but wasn't known.

This is 100% correct.

TWIV ramps up the heat ~34:15 saying this conspiracy theory that would involve at minimum a few people in the lab knowing that the virus was under study.

And "even with central control in China and everything that could be used to suppress" he thinks the secret would've leaked.

I brought up this exact issue months ago. If TWIV has a good plan for whistleblowers in China to leak information to trustworthy parties outside of China, could you please enlighten us?

https://twitter.com/Ayjchan/status/1306398565363744772

This appears to be quite a common belief. That this secret is so hot that scientists in China who know about it wouldn't be able to handle it.

Just emails. Straight to Nature, Science, and Cell.

https://twitter.com/Ayjchan/status/1366384517234249734

~39 min mark - on Peter Daszak being on the WHO-China team - TWIV discussion says very often the people most appropriate are the people who most likely have conflicts of interest.

Ok... then let's scrap the requirement to declare any COIs henceforth.

https://twitter.com/Ayjchan/status/1369753833560289282

I have very strong respect for professors, especially women & minorities, who have stuck it out in academia over decades and built a legacy of solid research, such as the guest of this TWIV episode. It's a position I could never even hope to reach.

But...

https://twitter.com/Ayjchan/status/1372356994103967746

If anyone thinks it is important to determine the origins of this pandemic & prevent similar pandemics, I recommend don't bother asking scientists to organize independent investigations.

Start an independent investigation. Bring in a few scientists & interview those with COIs.

I honestly believe this suggestion by TWIV that the WIV's Dr Zhengli Shi investigate the origins of COVID-19 was based in good faith - by scientists who couldn't believe that this virus could've leaked from a lab.

https://twitter.com/R_H_Ebright/status/1373787277126688778

But this reveals a glaring bias.

You've assumed that a particular hypothesis is so unlikely, that people who have direct COIs (actually, the strongest COIs) should have been appointed to investigate it.

The last point I'd like to make, after hearing this episode of TWIV, is to advocate for podcasts where people with conflicting perspectives lay out the scientific facts and debate each other.

I'm a lowly postdoc, but I'm game.

If I'm a conspiracist, it should become obvious.

And because I know some people might raise the "false equivalency" argument, here's the table of evidence surrounding the origins of covid.

Zero definitive evidence for natural spillover OR lab leak.

Hell, surround me with 12 natural origins proponents in a single podcast. I'm game.

Thanks to feedback in this thread, need to clarify that by natural origins proponents I mean experts who believe lab leak so unlikely that no credible investigation required, i.e., investigators with COIs are most appropriate.

https://twitter.com/Ayjchan/status/1372338572561383427

I'm not arguing that SARS2 / COVID-19 definitely came from a lab. Just that it could have. It is a plausible origins hypothesis. And this must be objectively investigated by parties with no COIs.