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study of animal viruses
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By (user no longer on site) OP
over a year ago
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saw on another thread people talking about the potential for the virus to have come from the lab in china and it got me thinking... (not looking to debate the source of this virus its more a hypothetical musing abut virus study in general)
there are obvious reasons that we study viruses ... the scientific knowledge we hold is what led us to create a vaccine so quickly
however do we think (particularly the microbiologists among us) that if this had been a leak (accidental or not) from a lab where we were doing research on animal viruses is it a case of eventually we reap what we sow?
does the risk of pottering about with viruses from animals outweigh the benefit of having that knowledge in the off chance it does manage to move from animal to human on its own?
or is that a common and likely scenario and its just good sense to study them in advance even if it does mean there is risk of it transferring to humans sooner by accident / means of our intervention |
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Pretty sure that there's many many lab's around the world in many countries studying all sorts of viruses most of which are probably deadly.
However I can't help thinking that without this research vaccines would never be created.
Obviously there's a huge difference between scientific research on medical ground's to understand the nature of the virus in a hope of understanding and finding a cure for it and others
Against
The manufacturing of a virus to be used in biological warfare or terrorism.
I'm not suggesting in any way shape or form that covid is the latter but honestly I wouldn't be surprised to hear from someone conspiracy theorists that they have proof that's what it is.
But to slightly contradict myself I do also genuinely believe that some things should be left well alone. If something is discovered to be so deadly and dangerous but isn't an issue unless a lama happens to mate with a monkey and the offspring are consumed by humans then leave it be bury it deep and forget it.
But much like Oppenheimer and his atomic buddies, people can't just leave bad alone. |
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By (user no longer on site) OP
over a year ago
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"Pretty sure that there's many many lab's around the world in many countries studying all sorts of viruses most of which are probably deadly.
However I can't help thinking that without this research vaccines would never be created.
Obviously there's a huge difference between scientific research on medical ground's to understand the nature of the virus in a hope of understanding and finding a cure for it and others
Against
The manufacturing of a virus to be used in biological warfare or terrorism.
I'm not suggesting in any way shape or form that covid is the latter but honestly I wouldn't be surprised to hear from someone conspiracy theorists that they have proof that's what it is.
But to slightly contradict myself I do also genuinely believe that some things should be left well alone. If something is discovered to be so deadly and dangerous but isn't an issue unless a lama happens to mate with a monkey and the offspring are consumed by humans then leave it be bury it deep and forget it.
But much like Oppenheimer and his atomic buddies, people can't just leave bad alone."
im similarly torn was wondering if anyone with a but note expertise in the field could come along and say no definitely worth it or no definitely too risky ... but maybe even there its a case of how you look at it and up for debate |
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"saw on another thread people talking about the potential for the virus to have come from the lab in china and it got me thinking... (not looking to debate the source of this virus its more a hypothetical musing abut virus study in general)
there are obvious reasons that we study viruses ... the scientific knowledge we hold is what led us to create a vaccine so quickly
however do we think (particularly the microbiologists among us) that if this had been a leak (accidental or not) from a lab where we were doing research on animal viruses is it a case of eventually we reap what we sow?
does the risk of pottering about with viruses from animals outweigh the benefit of having that knowledge in the off chance it does manage to move from animal to human on its own?
or is that a common and likely scenario and its just good sense to study them in advance even if it does mean there is risk of it transferring to humans sooner by accident / means of our intervention "
Totally get this argument!
There are labs around the world studying stuff which could be just as disastrous leaking! It’s really scary!
David Attenborough did a video a few years ago about the effect of global warming on viruses too!
Terrifying |
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Understanding, treating and preventing viral disease in animals is important, because we live in close proximity to companion and other domesticated animals for a start. And it's important to know and understand the likelihood of viruses from animal reservoirs reaching humans. Ebola originated in monkeys and apes. Plenty of diseases that affect humans have animal reservoirs or vectors and so we do need to study that (in my personal microbiological opinion). |
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Viral research is fine...if they know how to control the hazards associated with this
With reference to the 1916 polio epidemic an author wrote:
"The definitive account of the epidemic from the US
Public Health Service [1] concluded that the outbreak had
remarkable features: the extent and intensity was beyond
all previous experience; the origin was remarkably definite
in time and place; there was a strikingly uniform radial
spread from this focus
The unique features of the epidemic and
its sudden appearance have never been explained. A New York laboratory was passaging poliovirus in primate brains, a technique which increased pathogenicity. I propose that highly virulent virus escaped and caused the epidemic.
Scientists,
technical and animal house staff were unaware that they could be infected by poliovirus which could then infect others.
All laboratory workers must be constantly reminded of the dangers which can arise from the escape of pathogens from
their work."
The outbreak is believed to have been responsible for 23000 cases and 5000 deaths.
And the epicentre of this outbreak was only 3 miles from the Rockefeller institute Labs where the highly virulent strain of polio was produced.
The author writes about untrained personnel working in the animal houses in those times and suggests how unaware they may have been of how easily they could transmit viral pathogens outside of their workplace.
Though this was a century ago and more stringent practices govern both biohazard labs and animal houses, you just never know do you? |
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I'm not sure we can make comparisons with 1916. A definition of viruses as obligate parasites didn't come till 1926 and imaging with electron microscopes came in the 1930s. Scientists did know about some viral diseases but didn't know that viruses actually caused them, if that makes sense? Many late 19th century microbiologists said there were infectious agents that were too small to be viewed under microscopes (they were right) but they obviously could identify and study them.
Infection control measures for viral diseases would be completely sub standard for any lab of that era. |
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"Some of the experiments — “gain of function” experiments — aimed to create new, more virulent, or more infectious strains of diseases in an effort to predict and therefore defend against threats that might conceivably arise in nature. The term gain of function is itself a euphemism; the Obama White House more accurately described this work as “experiments that may be reasonably anticipated to confer attributes to influenza, MERS, or SARS viruses such that the virus would have enhanced pathogenicity and/or transmissibility in mammals via the respiratory route.” The virologists who carried out these experiments have accomplished amazing feats of genetic transmutation, no question, and there have been very few publicized accidents over the years. But there have been some.
And we were warned, repeatedly. The intentional creation of new microbes that combine virulence with heightened transmissibility “poses extraordinary risks to the public,” wrote infectious-disease experts Marc Lipsitch and Thomas Inglesby in 2014. “A rigorous and transparent risk-assessment process for this work has not yet been established.” That’s still true today. In 2012, in Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Lynn Klotz warned that there was an 80 percent chance, given how many laboratories were then handling virulent viro-varietals, that a leak of a potential pandemic pathogen would occur sometime in the next 12 years."
https://nymag.com/intelligencer/article/coronavirus-lab-escape-theory.html |
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"Woefully insufficient input has been obtained from a wide variety of scientists and from many other stakeholders among the general public. It is unethical to place so many members of the public at risk and then consult only scientists—or, even worse, just a small subset of scientists—and exclude others from the decision-making and oversight process … In many cases, conversations have only involved infectious-disease researchers and conflicts of interests among participants have not been adequately acknowledged or addressed … It is our responsibility as scientists to explain the rationale behind our work, including its benefits and risks, to the general public in terms that are accessible to those with an average level of education, rather than to be dismissive. This is especially important when the work has important consequences for the whole of society (Relman in Duprex et al. 2015, pp. 61–63)."
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4996883/ |
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By (user no longer on site) OP
over a year ago
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""Woefully insufficient input has been obtained from a wide variety of scientists and from many other stakeholders among the general public. It is unethical to place so many members of the public at risk and then consult only scientists—or, even worse, just a small subset of scientists—and exclude others from the decision-making and oversight process … In many cases, conversations have only involved infectious-disease researchers and conflicts of interests among participants have not been adequately acknowledged or addressed … It is our responsibility as scientists to explain the rationale behind our work, including its benefits and risks, to the general public in terms that are accessible to those with an average level of education, rather than to be dismissive. This is especially important when the work has important consequences for the whole of society (Relman in Duprex et al. 2015, pp. 61–63)."
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4996883/"
i disagree with this because someone like me for example has no real concept of the risk vs reward so why should i have a say
i wonder if there should be a global body of experts from various countries though who know what viruses are being investigated where in the world at all times and that they set and check global safety standards
i imagine we myst have similar already on things like WMD? do NATO do that? |
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I always thought that we study animal viruses, to combat them by making a vaccine. Also to see if we can weaponise them. Look at the russian variant of anthrax, they engineered it to be resistant to antibiotics. |
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"I always thought that we study animal viruses, to combat them by making a vaccine. Also to see if we can weaponise them. Look at the russian variant of anthrax, they engineered it to be resistant to antibiotics."
Anthrax is bacterial   |
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"What about in marine life.. as well as the dangers of the sea.. what virus and bacteria lurks there.. ?"
Loads and loads. Some really cool stuff living around hydrothermal vents. Methane metabolisers etc. Very interesting indeed  |
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By (user no longer on site)
over a year ago
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"saw on another thread people talking about the potential for the virus to have come from the lab in china and it got me thinking... (not looking to debate the source of this virus its more a hypothetical musing abut virus study in general)
there are obvious reasons that we study viruses ... the scientific knowledge we hold is what led us to create a vaccine so quickly
however do we think (particularly the microbiologists among us) that if this had been a leak (accidental or not) from a lab where we were doing research on animal viruses is it a case of eventually we reap what we sow?
does the risk of pottering about with viruses from animals outweigh the benefit of having that knowledge in the off chance it does manage to move from animal to human on its own?
or is that a common and likely scenario and its just good sense to study them in advance even if it does mean there is risk of it transferring to humans sooner by accident / means of our intervention "
Ebola,
Henda,
Nipah,
Influenza,
Mers
All have animal hosts- forget about the lab theories. There are enough bloody dangerous viruses in animal reservoirs to worry us.
Bats carry a shed load of corona viruses - 20 of the which are potentially zoonotic. They also can carry Mers, Ebola and Nipah.
Forget the conspiracy stuff- there is plenty of far more dangerous viruses out there than Covid |
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"saw on another thread people talking about the potential for the virus to have come from the lab in china and it got me thinking... (not looking to debate the source of this virus its more a hypothetical musing abut virus study in general)
there are obvious reasons that we study viruses ... the scientific knowledge we hold is what led us to create a vaccine so quickly
however do we think (particularly the microbiologists among us) that if this had been a leak (accidental or not) from a lab where we were doing research on animal viruses is it a case of eventually we reap what we sow?
does the risk of pottering about with viruses from animals outweigh the benefit of having that knowledge in the off chance it does manage to move from animal to human on its own?
or is that a common and likely scenario and its just good sense to study them in advance even if it does mean there is risk of it transferring to humans sooner by accident / means of our intervention "
I can see the point you're making, and the most simple reason I can think for wanting to do research with animal viruses and diseases is the health and welfare of livestock used for farming, which is getting very intensive around the world. The UK has been culling badgers for years to protect cows, there are vaccinations available for cows, so animal illness control is extremely important to our food supplies or farmers pockets at the very least. |
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By (user no longer on site) OP
over a year ago
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"saw on another thread people talking about the potential for the virus to have come from the lab in china and it got me thinking... (not looking to debate the source of this virus its more a hypothetical musing abut virus study in general)
there are obvious reasons that we study viruses ... the scientific knowledge we hold is what led us to create a vaccine so quickly
however do we think (particularly the microbiologists among us) that if this had been a leak (accidental or not) from a lab where we were doing research on animal viruses is it a case of eventually we reap what we sow?
does the risk of pottering about with viruses from animals outweigh the benefit of having that knowledge in the off chance it does manage to move from animal to human on its own?
or is that a common and likely scenario and its just good sense to study them in advance even if it does mean there is risk of it transferring to humans sooner by accident / means of our intervention
Ebola,
Henda,
Nipah,
Influenza,
Mers
All have animal hosts- forget about the lab theories. There are enough bloody dangerous viruses in animal reservoirs to worry us.
Bats carry a shed load of corona viruses - 20 of the which are potentially zoonotic. They also can carry Mers, Ebola and Nipah.
Forget the conspiracy stuff- there is plenty of far more dangerous viruses out there than Covid"
i wasn’t suggesting any conspiracy and specifically steered the post away from that , was just wondering how much we increase the risk of accidentally aiding a virus to move to humans by poking about with them and does the benefit of having the scientific knowledge still outweigh that risk |
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We should and do not limit our research and understanding of things generally, due to the risks, whether it's nuclear reactions, or viruses. We take appropriate precautions.
With the huge number of animal viruses that may 1 day jump to humans, we'd be stupid not to study them. This virus is certainly not the worst case scenario for us. And we must definitely learn much from this m, to improve our future responses.
Human errors happen, which is why we design systems to mitigate for the potential of them. We can have secure systems in place that fully contain potentially catastrophic specimens. |
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Have a look at the history of HM Government's Porton Down installation in Wiltshire.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/how-british-government-subjected-thousands-people-chemical-and-biological-warfare-trials-during-cold-war-10376411.html
Is it any wonder where we are today? Regimes around the world have being playing with viruses for at least 70 years now. |
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I am convinced that there are hidden dangers lurking in the deepest waters. I have seen documentaries where subermarines can go deeper than any skin diver. The pictures are often shocking. What organisms lurk in that mud? I am not a fan of beam trawling where they effectively churn up the seafloor. Any unsuspecting trawlerman could pick up bugs and bacteria and pass it on to the wider population... |
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By *69BANMan
over a year ago
Reading |
Study of all viruses is much needed. Plants/crops suffer greatly from viruses, there is now cancer treatment using viruses, as well as understanding how viruses cause cancer (HPV etc).
Check out virus vs labcoat on Instagram, not only a great science communicator but also hot! |
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