And now that those files have been sealed and the WHO will likely not push China too much to try to obtain them, we may never know the exact full story, unfortunately, which of course only adds to the wild speculation that can happen when important details are not filled in. It is a vicious cycle that none of us wants to repeat.wilmwolf80 said:
"The article mentions some of the well know viral escapes from labs around the world, some of which I have read studies about in the past. Accidents happen, even when the best of safeguards are in place. When accidents do happen, it is important and necessary for there to be total transparency as to what happened and in this case, it definitely appears transparency has been lacking."
Exactly. I don't care about assigning "blame" for Covid. But I care very much to know if pandemic level viruses are being created that can specifically target humans with no natural response, and if they are (which they appear to be based on the publicly available information cited in that article) are those creating them are doing so in a safe manner to prevent a possible pandemic causing escape scenario. Based on my own personal knowledge of safety standards in other industries in China, I lack confidence that the second part of my query can be guaranteed, and the fact that they have sealed those records would make me extremely, extremely suspicious that there is something in those records very relevant to our current pandemic. The fact that the former president came out and said that the virus came from a Chinese lab, and that a large number of people vehemently disagree with anything and everything he says, shouldn't impact the scientific process of actually determining the root source of the pandemic. All of the preparedness in the world won't help us the next time if a virus that specifically targets humans and is resistant to all known treatments happens to escape from a lab. Stockpile masks and ventilators all we want, but get to the truth here, regardless of where that leads.
ETA: when new details do get added to the story as they have been recently, it only makes China look that much worse. I still don't think they will release much, however.