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WHO Investigates Claims That Swine Flu Resulted From Human Error
Tom DBA writes "Bloomberg reports on claims that the swine flu could have been accidentally made in a lab, which are now being investigated by the World Health Organization. Quoting: 'Adrian Gibbs, 75, who collaborated on research that led to the development of Roche Holding AG's Tamiflu drug, said in an interview today that he intends to publish a report suggesting the new strain may have accidentally evolved in eggs scientists use to grow viruses and drugmakers use to make vaccines. Gibbs said that he came to his conclusion as part of an effort to trace the virus's origins by analyzing its genetic blueprint. ... Gibbs and two colleagues analyzed the publicly available sequences of hundreds of amino acids coded by each of the flu virus's eight genes. ... [The CDC's Nancy Cox says] since researchers don't have samples of swine flu viruses from South America and Africa, where the new strain may have evolved, those regions can't be ruled out as natural sources for the new flu.'"
Time has a related story evaluating the World Health Organization's response to H1N1.
That's what you fuckers get.
You fucked up and now you got swine flue.
"And someone thinks it was created somewhere in a lab?"
Why not? There was a lot of anti-US sentiment and conspiracy theories, namely blaming US exporting of farming practices and industry, and our "treatment" of Mexico. Keith Olbermann strongly suggested the US owned pig farm was the breeding ground, when he was attacking people who believed in shutting down the border (nevermind nearly every case was from a Mexico visit).
Keith says it, so it must be true. The US's fault. Exporting our farming stuff. Western practices. Free trade. US doing wrong. Again.
Oh, did he forget to mention it was only a partly run, invested US business?
And an area lacking a large chicken farm operation nearby? The swine flu seems at least a 3 way crossing (human, pig, chicken), requiring chickens, and, oh, well, it wasn't next to a chicken farm. Unlike earlier variants where such crossing were revealed several years before, due to swine and chicken grounds right on top of each other.
Anyways, a more important question is if leftist progressives give credence to the anti-US or anti-farming conspiracy theories, then when scientists speak out that it was created in a lab maybe and you disagree with them, does that make you anti-science and hence a closet moderate conservative?
"So the virus is found in the poor countryside of Mexico..."
Obvoiusly it's the poor people's fault due to the nearby US operation abuses.
The countryside is where it was initially found; not the same as where it started. Mexico's health system seems pretty crappy, so I doubt what they found first is really where it started.
"I've heard some far out conspiracy theories, but creating a mild flu in a lab and then transported out to Colillacarajo, Mexico? That's just dumb."
You're a moron. Dumb is taking 1 likely wrong assumption to back up an unknown and getting a conclusion out of it. Now that's out of the way...
There are still significant portions of the world where people think a gay male flight attendent was HIV patient zero too. Turns out, HIV was prevalent before that person was ever born. We didn't know about it.
Where something appears to have started early in an investigation is not the same as where something actually truly likely started. Let this play out. Until it's well investigated, it's not known.