Why COVID-19 didn't come from where you think it comes from - National Post

In this episode of Everything Should Be Better, Tristin Hopper explains why there is very good reason to believe that the most popular theory about COVID-19’s origins is not right. Watch the video above, or read the transcript below.

By now, you’ve probably seen this story: That U.S. and British intelligence are looking into the possibility that COVID-19 escaped from a Chinese laboratory.

Now to be clear; the allegation is NOT that China created this virus, and especially not that they created it as a bioweapon; let’s just get in front of that right now. Because that’s a really stupid theory. Here’s a tip about germ warfare: If you’re trying to unleash bio-war on the world, you usually don’t start by killing several thousand of your own people.

No, the allegation here is that a Chinese laboratory was working on some natural coronaviruses and whoops, one of the staff got infected and now 100,000 people are dead. Now that’s less of a crazy theory; because lab screwups happen all the time. Case in point: in 2014 it emerged that labs connected to the U.S. Centres for Disease Control were guilty of the following:

• Accidentally exposing a bunch of researchers to anthrax
• Losing some vials of smallpox
• Mailing out some mislabelled samples of superflu

Now, there is ZERO evidence that this pandemic came from a Chinese lab cockup. If you go around saying that the National Post told you that Xi Jinping’s China created the coronavirus in a lab, I’m going to be very angry with you.

However, there’s very good reason to believe that the most popular theory about the virus’ origins is … not right.

Early research is pretty clear that COVID-19 originated in a bat. But the theory is that a bat infected with the virus was taken to the Huanan Seafood Wholesale Market in China where it passed to humans and three months later Saturday Night Live looks like this:

The seafood market was first pinpointed in connection to the novel coronavirus in an early January statement by the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission. Then you’ve got a study in The Lancet saying that of the first 41 known cases of COVID-19, 27 of them had been to the market.

Problem number one: Crowded meat markets aren’t the most sanitary of places, but say you’ve got a dead bat with COVID-19. How does that bat suddenly infect dozens of people? Slaughtering weird animals is a great way to catch a new virus, but it’s not like those 27 people were making out with the bat. For instance, I’m guessing you’ve eaten raw chicken from a butcher at some point in your life. Did you and everyone else at the butcher shop just randomly catch salmonella?

Second, it would be really weird if we immediately knew the exact place where a new virus came from, particularly this virus; The whole reason COVID-19 is killing everyone is because it’s really hard to contact trace. You or I could have it right now and nobody will ever know.

And actually we usually never figure out the precise origins of viruses. Take HIV. All we really know is that it came from Africa somewhere about 120 years ago. We kind of know where SARS came from (Foshan municipalitiy in China’s Guangdong Province in late 2002) but it’s not like we had it pinpointed to a specific address within days of it emerging.

Third; remember that Lancet study? The earliest possible case they could find, identified in early December, was a guy who never left his house and had no connection to the market whatsoever. So before anyone got sick at that market, it seems like this virus was already all over Wuhan.

Now the seafood market still seems to play a key role in the early days of COVID-19, but not as the origin. What seems more likely is that someone who already had COVID-19 wandered into the market, maybe didn’t cover their mouth when they coughed and, bingo, a whole bunch of other shoppers have a new virus.

So, to review. We don’t know where COVID-19 comes from, it probably didn’t come from the Huanan market, and yeah, sometimes labs screw up and release unbelievably dangerous pathogens. Now wear a mask, wash your hands and keep your distance until we can tame this damned thing.

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Why COVID-19 didn't come from where you think it comes from - National Post
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