China's Alarming Experiment With a 100% Fatal Covid-Like Pangolin CoronaVirus ( www.medindia.net )

Cross-posted from: https://feddit.de/post/8224710

China has reportedly embarked on a controversial path of experimenting with a new Covid-like virus, characterized by a 100% fatality rate in mice. The unfolding scenario raises concerns about the potential risks associated with such experiments, especially the prospect of the virus spilling over into the human population.

HumbleFlamingo ,

It says a lot about the site when I'm immediately prompted to "ASK A DOCTOR ONLINE"... Oh and they make it really easy for me to make a tweet sensationalized it too, like real journalists do!

This isn't news, it's fear mongering propaganda. There's PLENTY of stuff to criticize china about. This is normal scientific/medical research.

t3rmit3 ,

One thing to keep in mind is that as transmissibility increases, lethality decreases, and that's not coincidental. The longer it takes for a virus to act, the longer a host body has to suppress it and adapt to it. Fast-acting and highly-lethal viruses depend on carrier populations (like pangolins in this case) to survive, and many individual viral mutations with deadlier characteristics emerge and then die without ever even reaching another host.

Is it possible that you could genetically-engineer a virus to both have a long incubation period AND incredibly high mortality rate? I'm sure it is, but that is not the claim here, just that they are experimenting with a high-mortality, naturally-occurring Coronavirus.

Zworf ,

Is it possible that you could genetically-engineer a virus to both have a long incubation period AND incredibly high mortality rate? I’m sure it is

Case in point: HIV. We're lucky that was not airborne. The whole world would have been infected by the time people started dying.

Overzeetop ,

IT sounds all gloom and doom, but if the original had been that effective we'd have a smaller vaccine-denier population right now. Silver linings and all...

Moira_Mayhem ,

Maybe it makes me a monster but I feel we would have been a lot better off with a higher mortality rate, and I say this as a person who has had covid twice.

raccoona_nongrata ,
@raccoona_nongrata@beehaw.org avatar

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    Moira_Mayhem ,

    I think you're missing the point: If covid had been a lot more lethal, then the people who acted in belligerent ignorance would be a significantly smaller portion of the population afterwards.

    I'm not here to change people's minds, that basically impossible unless you are a demagogue.

    On the other hand, if the most stubborn, ignorant, and easily fooled people had the brunt of mortalities (which so far very study indicates is true), then if there was a 20% mortality rate, consider what the population of the nation would look after that.

    Does that make me a monster? Probably.

    ninjan ,

    Worth noting that most Coronavirus aren't compatible with humans. The only real danger here is if they actually try to make it human compatible but then we're talking research that really can't be called much else than biological warfare research and that's a big no-no.

    TWeaK ,

    Even then, a 100% fatality rate likely has very poor transmission.

    Also, this is China, so claims of effectiveness should be taken with a grain of salt.

    tesseract ,

    The main issue here is that it's the evolution we're talking about. Even if China is exaggerating, it's not a stretch to think that the virus could become infectious or even transmissible among humans. And remember that covid19 has an asymptomatic high transmission phase. Again, it's not a stretch to think that a lower fatality rate or a longer incubation period could lead to a high transmission rate. To put it simply, it's not favorable for even the most incompetent people to play with bioweapons - the resilience of evolutionary biology more than makes up for it.

    TWeaK ,

    Yes but ultimately covid 19 had a relatively low fatality rate. It's still high compared to things like cold and flu, but low compared to many other diseases. Before the vaccines, young people generally didn't die, it primarily affected the old and vulnerable.

    While it absolutely is a concern - in particular that China is developing these things with apparent malicious intent - there is likely going to be some sort of engineering trade off between fatality and transmitability.

    jarfil ,
    @jarfil@beehaw.org avatar

    Flu type viruses have three phases: incubation, infection, fatality.

    It's imaginable that a virus with very short incubation and infection phases, could be delivered to a target population either via the water supply, or by directly spraying it over them.

    A virus with long incubation, but short infection and quick fatality phases. Could be risked to be let go freely, and still reasonably expect to be able to contain the target population.

    If the virus also took into account additional markers to control the duration and severity of each phase, then theoretically.you could design a virus that gave a mild flu to everyone, but at the same time quickly killed some target population, or even a single individual with a 100% fatality rate (for the intended target).

    baggins ,
    @baggins@beehaw.org avatar

    That doesn't mean they won't try. Who is going to stop them? Nobody, because we all want cheap tat from Temu and Shein.

    wandermind ,

    I've always felt that biological warfare is a really stupid idea for everyone involved. Like, stuff like nuclear and chemical weapons is not nice, but the effects are relatively localized. With biological warfare though, there is no way to absolutely contain the pathogen and to prevent its spread in your own population.

    ninjan ,

    Stupid, evil and risky sure. But nothing will ever be as effective at absolutely and surely decimating the opposition. Vaccines / Antidotes and very careful, deliberate and sinister targeting while limiting ability to mutate can mitigate most of the MAD aspects making a far more terrifying weapon than nukes in how virtually guaranteed to end a nation, continent, planet you can make them.

    jarfil ,
    @jarfil@beehaw.org avatar

    Pathogen design is reaching a level where it might be feasible to target it against a single physical trait.

    Like: if no proper encoding found in the RNA for insulin producing cells, induce some pancreas cells to produce insulin.

    Or: if blood cell presents AB+ markers, induce apoptosis.

    There are over 40 blood type types identified so far, and new ones keep getting added... plus hundreds of other types of cell markers... which should let one create a genocidal pathogen against a very closely delimited population (plus some collateral damage, but when has that stopped anyone?).

    acockworkorange ,

    I for one completely and blindly trust Winnie the Pooh and his minions not to jeopardize my health.

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