Thread by @emmecola

One last thread on the origins of #SARSCoV2 before the upcoming publication of the US intelligence report. First of all, there are two things that might be even more important than the origin itself: research ethics and scientific debate. 1/

Since the beginning, some scientists working in Chinese institutions haven't been fully transparent. The history of #RaTG13 and the issues with its sequencing data, the miners pneumonia, the missing database, the pangolin CoV data. Hiding info, playing with words. Bad science. 2/

The second thing that I didn't like was the suppression of an open dialogue between scientists, which lasted for several months. Now it's easier for scientists to freely talk about the different scenarios, but do you remember how difficult it was one year ago? 3/

Most scientists remained silent, or just cited the Proximal Origin paper without any critical evaluation of its content. Too busy with their work? Maybe. But I have a feeling that a lot of them were afraid to join a discussion that had become 100% political, because of #Trump. 4/

Back then, those who dared to talk about experiments or lab leaks were mocked and accused of promoting #conspiracy theories. It goes without saying that in that environment, skeptical scientists preferred to stay quiet. 5/

Even worse, we later discovered that the same scientists who were so sure about the natural origin of the virus had expressed before the very same doubts of the so-called "conspiracy theorists". Taking this into account, their patronizing attitude was even more irritating. 6/

The lack of #transparency from China and the lack of a proper debate among scientists are the two things that led me to tweet and write articles on this topic. Those practices were harming #science reputation, and I couldn't stay silent: I love science! 7/

Now everything is different, thanks to the presidency change and the famous Science letter. Scientists seem to be more open to other interpretations, they discuss (sometimes fiercely) and highlight the weaknesses in each other's arguments. Science at work, finally. 8/

I am sorry for the general public, who might feel a bit confused by the narrative shift and the revival of the lab leak hypothesis. But this is what happens when scientists make bold claims without enough evidence, and pretend there is a #consensus when there is none. 9/

A natural #spillover and a #LabLeak have always been plausible hypotheses. Both have circumstantial evidence on their side, both suffer inconsistencies or lack of data. Where did SARS2 come from? Nobody knows, but science is now in a better position to find it out. 10/

This thread will disappoint many of my lab leak followers and irritate someone in the other camp. But I don't care, this is what I think and always thought.