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28 Jun, 21 tweets, 18 min read
1/T

This thread will look at some statements in @zeynep's NYT article on lab leak conspiracism.

Some preliminary notes first.






nytimes.com/2021/06/25/opi…
[archive.is/hFqmR]
2/T

I + others argued with lab conspiracists for over a year. We saw their arguments + addressed them in detail; that's how we know they're nonsense.

I'll thus often link to threads that explain points in detail, so I don't have to rehash it all here.

3/T

You often need serology (i.e. antibody) studies to tell who's been infected, since many infections are missed otherwise.

Those studies show more prior infections with SARS-like viruses.




archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
4/T

Zoonotic transfer outside of a lab happens so often it's taken for granted. You can't list them all transfers because they're so numerous, unlike lab leaks.

It's more the rule rather than the exception, given the ease of infection outside of a lab.

tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.10…
5/T

Given that, one needs *evidence* to claim a lab leak instead of zoonotic transfer, not just paranoid suspicion

21:33 to 24:06 :

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…



npr.org/sections/goats…
6/T

There are labs across China studying SARS coronaviruses, infecting organisms or cells with them, etc.

Conspiracy theorists would have made stuff up about those labs as well, if an outbreak occurred in the same city as them.



archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
7/T

The 'proximity to a lab' argument is weak anyway. For instance, it would just as easily led to the (wrong) conclusions that SARS-CoV-1 and MERS-CoV came from labs. And it uses the poor reasoning about probability typical among conspiracist theorists.

8/T

As an immunologist, I can say that the whole 'RaTG13 / miners' saga helped convince me that many, if not most, SARS-CoV-2 lab conspiracists are incompetent and/or dishonest.

That includes @TheSeeker268 + others at DRASTIC.



archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
9/T

For example, it's unlikely SARS-CoV-2 came from RaTG13, given the evolutionary distance between them. They're more like distant cousins (ex: humans vs. chimpanzees). So bringing it up is a red herring



europeanreview.org/wp/wp-content/…

onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.10…
10/T

Calling the DRASTIC team "internet sleuths" is more respect than they merit. They're a bunch of paranoid conspiracists who can't get basic biology right.

Also, suspicious activity happens in the absence of a lab leak.



archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
11/T

And again, the level of protection researchers have when working with viruses is more than the non-existent levels of protection that everyday people have when exposed to viruses.

21:33 to 24:06 :

thebulletin.org/2020/05/let-ev…
12/T

@zeynep peddles disinformation from Rupert Murdoch's media empire, via Sky News. That's the level of fact-checking we're dealing from her here.

She owes people an apology.


[with: ]

archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
13/T

The video she said "reportedly showed live bats in the [WIV]" actually showed an Australian lab where Dr. Shi formerly worked.

@nailbomb3 (an actual "internet sleuth") figured that out, while DRASTIC members credulously fell for the disinformation

14/T

To cite @snpsandsnRNPs again:
@zeynep is "a sociologist with no biology training."

For those of us with experience with biology training, SARS-CoV-2 does not look like intelligently engineered by humans. It looks cobbled together by nature.

archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
15/T

This is 1 reason why many say dealing with lab conspiracists is like dealing with creationists / Intelligent Design proponents:

Attributing to intelligence what actually is unguided evolution.





16/T

SARS-CoV-2, SARS-CoV-1, MERS-CoV, etc. are BSL3 pathogens, which means some forms of work on them can be done under BSL2 conditions.

That's been known for over a year. If that's news to some people, that's their problem. 🤷‍♂️



archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
17/T

Then @zeynep peddled misinformation and/or disinformation from denialists + crackpots. Worse, it's in immunology, my field of expertise.

Could she not have run this by anyone with actual expertise on serology? 😑



archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
18/T

The first discovered cases of SARS-CoV-1 were not near the likely site of original zoonotic transfer. Same for HIV. And ebolavirus. And...

But when that happens with SARS-CoV-2, all of a sudden non-experts become suspicious



archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
19/T

What surprised to an uninformed non-expert can be mundane to an informed expert.

Hence why it's so important for non-experts listen to expert virologists, geneticists, etc. who actually have experience dealing with past pathogen outbreaks.

20/T

You know who was already canvassing the likelihood that the first SARS-CoV-2 zoonotic transfer occurred early?:

Kristian Anderson et al. in early 2020
nature.com/articles/s4159…

Congratulations to some people for finally catching up.

archive.is/hFqmR#selectio…
21/T

So overall, @zeynep's article is not good, but it's not as bad as some of the ludicrous nonsense from DRASTIC, Nicholas Wade, Steven Quay, etc.

It contains clear misinformation / disinformation, along with some good points. I wouldn't recommend it to non-experts, though.

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More from @AtomsksSanakan

Atomsk's Sanakan Profile picture
28 Jun
1/U

Sometimes John Ioannidis just makes me laugh. 😀

In the slide below, Ioannidis discusses age-specific IFR (infection fatality rate), i.e. what proportion of SARS-CoV-2-infected people die of the disease COVID-19 at various ages.

22:23 - 23:18:
2/U

Here's the work Ioannidis is likely referring to:

Axfors (Ioannidis is the lead author)
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…

Levin (from @GidMK + @BillHanage)
link.springer.com/article/10.100…

O'Driscoll
nature.com/articles/s4158…

CDC
web.archive.org/web/2021032419…

3/U

Ioannidis says his Axfors estimates mostly agree with O'Driscoll:

from 23:04


Yet experts noted for around year that his Axfors estimate is a low outlier.

So what's going on here?

publichealthontario.ca/-/media/docume…
Read 9 tweets
Atomsk's Sanakan Profile picture
27 Jun
1/F

SARS-CoV-2 lab conspiracy theorists are again misrepresenting scientific fields they have not bothered to try to understand.

This time they're applying their paranoid distortions to immunology. So that deserves a thread.



Image
2/F

When SARS-CoV-2 infects a person, the person's immune system increases production of proteins known as antibodies that bind to SARS-CoV-2.

So if SARS-CoV-2 escaped from the WIV by infecting staff, then that would show up in antibody tests.

Yet...
who.int/docs/default-s… Image
3/F

Conspiracists don't like that result, so they abuse an antibody study I discussed awhile back.

That study estimates ~4% of Wuhan had increased antibody levels; i.e. ~4% seroprevalence, so ~4% of people previously infected.



thelancet.com/journals/lanwp… Image
Read 11 tweets
Atomsk's Sanakan Profile picture
8 Jun
1/Z

An annoying thing about many SARS-CoV-2 lab conspiracists is they don't learn a da*n thing, no matter how much it's explained to them.

Example from WSJ, Steven Quay, + Richard Muller:

"The science suggests a Wuhan lab leak"
wsj.com/articles/the-s…
archive.is/MfmLd Image
2/Z

Quay + Muller's 'codon usage' point is not new.

Ex: Bret Weinstein was making the point months ago, and Nicholas Wade did more recently.

It's a favorite talking among the conspiracy theorists.



https://t.co/jGJkNUBui0

thebulletin.org/2021/05/the-or… Image
3/Z

A crucial concept to understand here is copy-choice error.

See below:

virological.org/t/tackling-rum…
virological.org/t/the-sarbecov…
virological.org/t/tackling-rum…

link.springer.com/article/10.100…
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…
ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/P…


Image
Read 14 tweets
Atomsk's Sanakan Profile picture
23 May
1/V

Quick thread on another reason why I don't trust Vinay Prasad.



I'm an immunologist, and one of the main reasons I first came to Twitter 4 years ago was to debunk vaccine denialism.



2/V

To be blunt, I know more about immunology and vaccines than Prasad. This is not his field of expertise.

The study he cites does not support the claim he made:
science.sciencemag.org/content/371/65…

And the John Snow memo is pretty good:



3/V

There were good reasons for thinking COVID-19 vaccines would induce a better immune response than infection.

I was not the first to point this out (h/t @drjenndowd).




Read 10 tweets
Atomsk's Sanakan Profile picture
14 May
1/N
Many non-experts peddle garbage articles from Nicholas Wade defending the conspiracy theory that SARS-CoV-2 came from a lab.

This shows much of the defense of 'lab leak' isn't based on knowledge, but instead paranoia, etc.

nicholaswade.medium.com/origin-of-covi…

thebulletin.org/2021/05/the-or… Image
2/N
For context:
This is not the first time Nicholas Wade said nonsense outside his field of expertise to suit his preferred ideologically-motivated narrative, despite experts correcting him.



sciencemag.org/news/2014/08/g…

cehg.stanford.edu/letter-from-po… Image
3/N
Wade's discussion of the furin cleavage site shows willful ignorance of what's been known about SARS-CoV-2 since at least May 2020.






thebulletin.org/2021/05/the-or… Image
Read 10 tweets
Atomsk's Sanakan Profile picture
28 Apr
1/Y

Many criticized the article below co-authored by Jay Bhattacharya, who also co-wrote the Great Barrington Declaration.

But I haven't seen a detailed explanation of why the article was wrong + dangerous. So I'll give one here



theprint.in/opinion/majori…
2/Y

It was clear Bhattacharya + others were wrong long before the recent resurgence of COVID-19 in India.
So this is not just "hindsight is 20/20."





archive.is/wxqye#selectio…
[judithcurry.com/2021/01/10/cov…]

3/Y

Imagine the spread of SARS-CoV-2 as an accelerating car.

Some brakes help slow the car, such as masks, social distancing, contract tracing, etc.

But even without brakes, the car will eventually start slowing down on its own; that's herd immunity.

Read 26 tweets

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