Covid-19 Conspiracy Narrative

UPDATE 9/14/2023

The video I previously linked is no longer available. Therefore, in the wake of allegations by the CIA whistleblower that their consulting experts were financially incentivized to trash the lab origins narrative, I will add to this post my published findings on that narrative. I am not making truth claims here. I am merely reporting the lab origins narrative based on my research findings:

 

Nadesan, M. (2022). Crises Narratives Defining the Covid-19 Pandemic: Expert Uncertainties and Conspiratorial Sensemaking. American Behavioral Scientist. https://doi.org/10.1177/00027642221085893

... Research studies posted February-March aimed at distinguishing the genetic features of the novel coronavirus from SARS and MERS and mapping unique invasive capacities under laboratory condition, resulting in identification of two special features:

(1)   SARS-CoV-2’s optimized receptor binding-domain (RBD), which refers to the way the virus binds with the human angiotensin-converting enzyme 2 (ACE2) molecule as a result of its unique S protein, far outstripping the capacity of SARS

(2)   The “functional polybasic (furin) cleavage site,” which becomes the target of considerable scientific debate (Coutard et al., 2020). The particular S protein increases the binding power of SARS-CoV-2 to human cells, while the furin, or special enzyme, facilitates its capacity to cleave cell surface proteins to penetrate their exteriors (“How furin,” 2020).

The unique S protein and furin cleavage generated expert debate regarding the probability these features could have evolved naturally. A computational study posted at BioRxiv January 31, 2020 by Indian researchers challenged the natural evolution of the furin feature, stoking controversy leading to the study’s retraction (Pradhan et al., 2020).  More scientific challenges to the natural evolution theme followed (e.g., see Piplani et al., 2020).

The idea that SARS-CoV-2 might be chimeric (i.e., genetically engineered), rather than naturally evolved, was rejected by the study, “Proximal Origin of SARS-CoV-2,” published March 17, 2020:

Although the evidence shows that SARS-CoV-2 is not a purposefully manipulated virus, it is currently impossible to prove or disprove the other theories of its origin described here. However, since we observed all notable SARS-CoV-2 features, including the optimized RBD and polybasic cleavage site, in related coronaviruses in nature, we do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible. (Andersen, et al., 2020)

Although widely cited by the news-media, the arguments of this paper failed to dispel expert dissent, prompting the WHO Assembly to pass a resolution in May, 2020 to investigate the “source of the virus and the route of introduction to the human population” (cited in Broad, 2020).

...

2020 U.S. news coverage of the lab peaked mid-April through mid-May when President Trump stated intelligence agencies were investigating an accidental lab release, causing push-back from China. China not only denied the Wuhan lab theory, but also chastised the European Union for claiming Chinese culpability (Brennan, 2020). However, in June the lab narrative suddenly disappeared from U.S. news headlines, overshadowed by Black Lives Matter demonstrations. In contrast, European media continued to query origins. In late April 2020, the staid German newspaper Deutsche Welle (DW) investigated key narrative elements, concluding that “it can't be said for certain that the pandemic didn't accidentally enter the world via the Wuhan lab” (Schmidt, 2020). The BBC also examined evidence for a lab release on May 1, 2020 (Rincon, 2020). Two weeks later, May 13, Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau declared that the world had questions, “particularly” for China regarding origins (Connolly, 2020). In June, U.K. media reported that Sir Richard Dearborn, former head of British’s secret service MI6 (1999-2004), insisted lab origins couldn’t be discounted because of the virus’ peculiarly optimized capacities (Gardner, 2020)....

 

 

Nadesan, M. (2021). Technological Utopia, End Times and the SARS-CoV-2 Crisis: A Genealogy of Crisis Ideoscapes and Mediascapes. Communication +1, 8(1). https://doi.org/10.7275/x6qx-0r31. https://scholarworks.umass.edu/cpo/vol8/iss1/8/

...the very act of defining a viral outbreak was a highly-expert operation occurring through an assemblage of government and private institutions. Early articulations of a novel coronavirus created symbolic sequencing unity out of viral multiplicity and did so by assigning the multiplicity to a pre-existing coronavirus set (Nadesan, 2022). On February 3, the scientific journal Nature published two studies, one led by Wu (2020) and the other by Zhou (2020), separately identifying the genetic sequence of the newly discovered coronavirus. Careful reconstruction of the history of the Wu publication reveals political particularities. 

 January 5, 2020, before the Nature publications, the genetic sequence for the novel coronavirus was posted and pre-published (January 12) on virological.org, an open platform for sharing and discussion of pre-prints, and GenBank, an open-access data repository, by researchers from the Shanghai Public Health Clinical Centre, led by Zhang Yongzhen but ultimately published under Wu (2020). The Zhang-Wu team had reported sequencing results to China’s National Health Commission, but subsequently published online after the commission’s failure to act on their recommendations for control. In seeming retaliation, Zhang’s Shanghai centre was then ordered to close for “rectification” that same day, January 12, by the Shanghai Health Commission (Pinghui, 2020). Despite this rectification, the team’s genetic sequence, MN908947.1 (Zhang et al., 2020) was updated twice, with the second version (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/MN908947.2) published January 14, and a third version adopted January 18, 2020 (https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/MN908947.3). 

Authorship of the final and peer-reviewed version published in Nature February 3 pages 265-269 included two new authors (Ming-Li Yuan and Edward Holmes). On pages 270-273 of the same issue, yet another publication of genetic sequencing appears, led by Peng Zhou (2020) and including Zheng Li Shi, both of the CAS Key Laboratory of Special Pathogens, Wuhan Institute of Virology. All of these authorities emerge as key figures in online conspiratorial sense-making about viral origins and effects (Nadesan, in press). Controversy over the virus origins was exacerbated by revelations that China had ordered these and other early viral samples to be destroyed in late December, leaving no material traces for subsequent sequencing verification (Chin, 2020). The one, now named SARS-CoV-2, is an operation in the sense described by Badiou. Yet, symbolic excesses have precluded closure and control from the very first articulation despite the behind-the-scenes operations of institutional power.

 

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September 14, 2023: I don't know what is real but I do know what is false and the zoonotic transfer narrative has the least evidence supporting it as compared to the Wuhan Lab and Fort Detrich narratives, the latter of which is discussed in the first article cited above.

You decide what is real....

 

Definitely worth viewing:

Make your own judgment....