Viral
A new virus descended on the human species in 2019 wreaking unprecedented havoc. Finding out where it came from and how it first jumped into people is an urgent priority, but early expectations that this would prove an easy question to answer have been dashed. Nearly two years into the pandemic, the crucial mystery of the origin of SARS-CoV-2 is not only unresolved but has deepened. In this uniquely insightful book, a scientist and a writer join forces to try to get to the bottom of how a virus whose closest relations live in bats in subtropical southern China somehow managed to begin spreading among people more than 1,500 kilometres away in the city of Wuhan. They grapple with the baffling fact that the virus left none of the expected traces that such outbreaks usually create: no infected market animals or wildlife, no chains of early cases in travellers to the city, no smouldering epidemic in a rural area, no rapid adaptation of the virus to its new host--human beings. To try to solve this pressing mystery, Viral delves deep into the events of 2019 leading up to 2021, the details of what went on in animal markets and virology laboratories, the records and data hidden from sight within archived Chinese theses and websites, and the clues that can be coaxed from the very text of the virus's own genetic code. The result is a gripping detective story that takes the reader deeper and deeper into a metaphorical cave of mystery.
Stats for nerds
9recommend
20mentions
17people
2021–2025years
55% recommend45% neutral
Mentions per year
What Hacker News says
- "Viral" by Alina Chan and Matt Ridley is worth reading. But I don't think there's much doubt now that Sars-CoV2 was the result of reckless gain-of-function research conducted jointly between China's Wuhan Institute of Virology, America's Baric Lab in North Carolina, and facilitated by funding through EcoHealth Alliance, the NIH and the NIAID. Whoopsie.
- Eh, sure, the CIA isn't behind honest. China isn't being honest. There's too many parties with ulterior motives to trust anything being said. China has done a great job of looking like they're covering something up.
I read "Viral: The Search for the Origin of COVID-19 by Alina Chan and Matt Ridley" and it convinced me the lab leak theory was at least fairly likely. The proximity of the outbreak to WIV -- which was doing gain-of-function research of bat coronaviruses -- is convincing. Occam's razor and all.
- The best book I've read on the topic of the lab leak theory is "Viral" by Alina Chan & Matt Ridley. It goes into the nitty-gritty scientific detail as well, but also covers some of the things you mentioned too.
- what could possibly go wrong this time!
I strongly recommend “Viral” by Ridley and Chan to those who haven’t read it.
- The questions that are broadly acceptable to the corporate media - i.e. that are the subjects of written or spoken debate - are generally not the important or interesting questions. They're mostly click-bait fluff intended to up the 'engagement' factor.
The only one in that list that's of much interest is about the origins of the Covid pandemic, and even there the real question is whether or not to implement a global ban on gain-of-function research with infectious viruses and microbes. As far as the details on the origins of Covid and links to the Ecohealth-Alliance-funded Wuhan Institute of Virology, well, read a book (Viral by Chan & Ridley, 2021).
https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/58647975-viral
Here's an alternative list of questions that I'd argue really matter, but which are typically avoided by corporate media:
1. Is the US economy overly controlled by finance, and does this have serious negative repercussions for the long-term health of the economy? Is finance really capable of long-term planning and basic infrastructure development?
2. Is the US military budget out of control? The (inflation-adjusted) size of that budget over the past few decades has certainly increased. Are those wasted resources? (A related question has to do with our military entanglements around the planet, such as with Saudi Arabia, Israel, NATO, etc.)
3. Do all of the free trade deals that the USA has pushed for over the past 40 years really help the US economy prosper, or are they the main reason for the huge wealth gap across American society and the destruction of the American manufacturing sector (and the rise of angry populist politics) ?
Now, those are interesting questions and I imagine views vary widely on those issues - but you won't see them addressed in our pathetic media system.
- A lot of the tweet mirrors what is described in more detail, and better sources, by Alina Chan in Viral, Search for the Origin of Covid-19. In my opinion a book worth reading, as it doesn't try too hard to point a finger but raises enough circumstantial arguments to support _anything other than a natural origin_ for Covid-19. Either way, CCP has caused enough damage (in my opinion, again) to never be trustworthy again.
Somewhere else in this thread, her medium is linked, and indeed she also writes clear and rational reviews of more recent literature.
