[HN Gopher] Controversial experiments that could make bird flu m...
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Controversial experiments that could make bird flu more risky to
resume (2019)
Author : shermablanca
Score : 53 points
Date : 2023-02-16 18:37 UTC (4 hours ago)
(HTM) web link (www.science.org)
(TXT) w3m dump (www.science.org)
| octonion wrote:
| [dead]
| doodlebugging wrote:
| With all this smoke, (H5N1 bird flu and Covid-19 GoF research
| funded for various researchers in the US and abroad) there has to
| be a fire somewhere.
|
| I can't wait for the accountability parade.
| [deleted]
| Y_Y wrote:
| Better not resume bird flu then
| stickfigure wrote:
| I was trying to figure out how bird flu would damage my CV.
| stonemetal12 wrote:
| Bird flu is down around Cobol in popularity. Sure they have
| their niches, but is that someplace you want to work?
| snshn wrote:
| Weird title, needs a comma after "risky", but I guess HN removes
| them while sanitizing
| gensym wrote:
| In other news: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-023-00283-y
|
| How many times would you be comfortable rolling a million-sided
| die for humanity's extinction?
| [deleted]
| candiddevmike wrote:
| I truthfully do not see the value (vs risk) in this kind of
| research. Humanity is too careless to do this kind of thing
| safely. Figure out better ways to model this in software instead,
| IM (uninformed) O.
| LatteLazy wrote:
| As long as china and other countries refuse to operate sanitary
| food chains, the risk they represent will be 1000s of times
| higher than a high security lab. That is why so many zoonotic
| diseases come from such places and so few from the rest of the
| world.
|
| Don't "strain out a fly and swallow a camel"...
| geysersam wrote:
| That, or because a fifth of the worlds population live there.
| mikeyouse wrote:
| A general defense is that nature is a far better incubator and
| gain-of-function laboratory that we could ever hope to be. A
| few billion birds have caught bird flu in the past decade, so
| we're talking about trillions and trillions of viruses
| constantly undergoing mutation in close proximity with farm
| mammals and humans all over the world... If we know the
| genetics of what turns a bird flu into one transmissible to
| humans, it's probably better to "get in front of it" rather
| than just awaiting that mutation to happen somewhere in nature
| for the first time.
| adrianb wrote:
| Trillions and trillions of mutations and still the most
| dangerous H5N1 viruses were created a decade ago by Fouchier
| and Kawaoka. And how did that help us prepare for the
| inevitable natural evolution of the same virus?
| mikeyouse wrote:
| Sure, but that's only if you restrict it to H5N1 instead of
| looking at the history of Influenza A and things like the
| Spanish Flu, which was the most deadly disease in human
| history and derived from a mutated bird flu.
|
| https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/nejmp058281
|
| Even still, H5N1 has repeatedly infected humans in the
| wild... the most famous case in Hong Kong infecting 18
| people and killing 6 of those. So you can make the case
| that GoF is irresponsible given the stakes, but it seems
| important to acknowledge that you're basically just hoping
| these horrific viruses don't mutate as we predict them to.
|
| https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/11938498/
| programmarchy wrote:
| hand-waving
| bboygravity wrote:
| There's a chance that being more informed might help form a
| different opinion more aligned with most informed people.
| rhelz wrote:
| Back in 2019, I was just working as hard as I could to keep my
| little world together. I'd already despaired of trying to do
| anything like get ahead.
|
| And then there are these guys taking billion dollar sledgehammers
| to the foundations of civil society.
| [deleted]
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(page generated 2023-02-16 23:01 UTC)