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Pompeo Backtracks About Wuhan Lab: The Latest In The Controversial Coronavirus Origin Theory

https://www.forbes.com/sites/jackbrewster/2020/05/06/pompeo-backtracks-about-wuhan-lab-the-latest-in-the-controversial-coronavirus-origin-theory/#4d26a2ad2f72

Secretary of State Mike Pompeo seemed to walk back an explosive allegation Wednesday, that “enormous evidence” linked the coronavirus outbreak to a laboratory in Wuhan, China, now saying “we don’t have certainty”—the latest turn of a controversial theory that started at the very beginning of COVID-19 outbreak:

Report says cellphone data suggests October shutdown at Wuhan lab, but experts are skeptical

https://www.nbcnews.com/politics/national-security/report-says-cellphone-data-suggests-october-shutdown-wuhan-lab-experts-n1202716

 A private analysis of cellphone location data purports to show that a high-security Wuhan laboratory studying coronaviruses shut down in October, three sources briefed on the matter told NBC News. U.S. spy agencies are reviewing the document, but intelligence analysts examined and couldn't confirm a similar theory previously, two senior officials say.

The report — obtained by the London-based NBC News Verification Unit — says there was no cellphone activity in a high-security portion of the Wuhan Institute of Virology from Oct. 7 through Oct. 24, 2019, and that there may have been a "hazardous event" sometime between Oct. 6 and Oct. 11.

It offers no direct evidence of a shutdown, or any proof for the theory that the virus emerged accidentally from the lab.

How deadly pathogens have escaped the lab — over and over again

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2019/3/20/18260669/deadly-pathogens-escape-lab-smallpox-bird-flu

Research into dangerous viruses and bacteria is important, but for the deadliest pathogens, it’s not clear the benefits are worth the risks.

 

Virus Researchers Cast Doubt On Theory Of Coronavirus Lab Accident

https://www.npr.org/sections/goatsandsoda/2020/04/23/841729646/virus-researchers-cast-doubt-on-theory-of-coronavirus-lab-accident

Virus researchers say there is virtually no chance that the new coronavirus was released as result of a laboratory accident in China or anywhere else.

The assessment, made by more than half-a-dozen scientists familiar with lab accidents and how research on coronaviruses is conducted, casts doubt on recent claims that a mistake may have unleashed the coronavirus on the world.

The Coronavirus Conspiracy Theory Doesn't Add Up. It's Also a Self-Defeating Diversion.

https://thewire.in/world/the-coronavirus-conspiracy-theory-doesnt-add-up-its-also-a-self-defeating-diversion

The standard narrative has  been that the virus originated in an animal and seafood market some 30 kms away from the  Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) where the Wuhan National Biosafety Laboratory is housed. Speaking to Fox News on April 15, Pompeo remarked that the wet market and the WIV were a “handful of miles away,” and that the US was “working diligently to figure it out.”

Subsequently, right-wing American publications and some tabloids began to run stories claiming that the outbreak originated in the lab. More extreme ones like the Washington Times even claimed in late January that the coronavirus may have originated in a lab linked to China’a biowarfare programme.

 

A detailed  analysis in NPR has suggested that “there is virtually no chance that the new coronavirus was released as a result of a laboratory accident.” After consulting 10 leading scientists who do the work of collecting samples of viruses from animals and understand how lab accidents happen, the NPR concluded that “an accidental release would have required a remarkable series of coincidences and deviations from well established experimental protocols.”

“The Discussion Is Basically Over”: Why Scientists Believe the Wuhan-Lab Coronavirus Origin Theory Is Highly Unlikely

https://www.vanityfair.com/news/2020/05/why-scientists-believe-the-wuhan-lab-coronavirus-origin-theory-is-highly-unlikely

Over the past couple of weeks, the theory that SARS-CoV-2 might have accidentally leaked from a lab inside the Wuhan Institute of Virology has become a heavily touted casus belli in President Trump’s new cold war with China, as administration officials build their case to blame the whole catastrophe on Xi Jinping’s Communist Party. The lab theory was pushed hard by Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, even as the chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff declared that in all likelihood, the virus did not originate in a lab. American allies, meanwhile, appear to be freaked out by the rumor-mongering. “We can’t repeat the mistakes of the past. The WMDs fiasco was not that long ago,” a former senior Australian security official told the Sydney Morning Herald.

 

The lab-accident scenario seems the stuff of Hollywood thrillers—and perfect as propaganda, which operates on principles similar to those of thrillers—but there are a few facts that give it a surface plausibility. The Wuhan lab happens to conduct bat-coronavirus research, and it also happens to be located not that far from the seafood market where an early cluster of cases first emerged in late 2019. But, appealing and useful as it is in certain kinds of narratives, the lab theory leaves many virology and epidemiology types highly skeptical. To get a sense of scientists’ reservations, I spoke with Kristian Andersen, a professor in the Department of Immunology and Microbiology at Scripps Research. He was the lead author on a March 17 paper, published in the journal Nature Medicine, that is seen as the definitive research supporting a natural virus origin. “We do not believe that any type of laboratory-based scenario is plausible,” Andersen’s team, which compared the available genome sequence data for known coronavirus strains, concluded.

Pork Chops vs. People: Battling Coronavirus in an Iowa Meat Plant

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/10/business/economy/coronavirus-tyson-plant-iowa.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

After President Trump’s executive order, meat plants are reopening. Can they do so without endangering their low-wage workers and their communities?

 

Rambam and accepting everything is really good

פירוש המשנה לרמב"ם מסכת ברכות פרק ט משנה ג

[ג] אמרו על הרעה מעין על הטובה ועל הטובה מעין על הרעה, ר"ל שאם באה עליו צרה אף על פי שתכליתה טוב מברך דיין האמת, וזהו מעין על הרעה. וכן אם באה עליו טובה אף על פי שתכליתה רע מברך הטוב והמטיב, וזהו מעין על הטובה. ודוגמת הבבא הראשונה, כגון שעבר שטפון על שדהו הרי זו רעה, אף על פי שתכליתה טובה שתרוה אדמתו, ואולי אף יביא אותו השטפון לאדמתו תועליות. ודוגמת הבבא השניה, כגון שמצא ממון וראהו אחר כשלקחו, הרי זו טובה. אף על פי שתכליתה רעה שאותו אדם שראהו ילשין עליו אצל המלך, ויענהו המלך וידרוש ממנו יותר ממה שמצא. וטעם דין זה שדברים המצוים הן שאין במציאותן ספק, ולכן מברך על מה שהוא עכשיו ולא יביט לסוף לפי שאותו הסוף אפשרי, ודיו לאפשרי היותו אפשרי. ופירוש לשעבר, החולף. לפי שאין מתפללים לה' על מה שכבר נעשה, אלא מתפללים לה' ומבקשים ממנו דברים האפשריים להבא. 

 פירוש המשנה לרמב"ם מסכת ברכות פרק ט משנה ה
[ה] אמרו כשם שהוא מברך על הטובה, ר"ל שיקבלם בשמחה ויכבוש רגשותיו ויישב דעתו כשמברך ברוך דיין האמת, עד שייראה כמו בזמן שהוא מברך הטוב והמטיב, וכמו שאומרים חכמים ברוב עניניהם כל מה דעביד משמיא לטב, וזה דבר מושכל אצל הנבונים אף על פי שלא הזהירה עליו תורה, לפי שהרבה דברים נחשבין לרע בתחלתם וסופם מביאים טובה גדולה, והרבה דברים נחשבים בראשיתם טוב ויהיה בסופם רע מאד ולכן אין ראוי לנבון להצטער בבוא צרה גדולה וגזירה הרת סכנה, לפי שאינו יודע התכלית. וגם אל יתפתה וישמח שמחה רבה כשתגיעהו טובה לפי מחשבתו, לפי שאינו יודע התכלית, וכן אסרו עליהם השלום להרבות בשמחה ושחוק זולתי אם היתה אותה השמחה בדבר נעלה כלומר עשיית הטוב ודרישתו. אבל האזהרה מהדאבון והצער הרי הוא מפורסם מאד בספרי הנביאים עד שאין צורך לדבר עליו. וכל זה אם לא היה אותו אדם שרוי בטוב מראשיתו ועד אחריתו ויחשוב החושב שהוא מאושר מאד, ואותו האושר המדומה יהיה הסבה למנוע ממנו האושר האמתי ויהיה הוא הסבה לטרדו מחיי העולם הבא, ועל כגון זה אמר יש דרך ישר לפני איש ואחריתה דרכי מות. ולכן יכון האדם מחשבתו ויבקש מהאל שיהיה כל מה שיקרהו בעולם הזה מטובותיו ורעותיו סבה להשגת האושר האמתי. ואמרו ביצר טוב וביצר רע, ר"ל שישים בלבו אהבת האל והאמונה בו אפילו בעת המרי והכעס והרוגז, שכל זה הוא יצר רע, כאמרם בכל דרכיך דעהו אפילו בדבר עבירה. ופירוש מדה, דרך, כלומר באיזה מצב שתהיה שבחהו והודהו.

Gainesville has become hot spot for coronavirus cases in Georgia, a state just starting to reopen

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/06/health/us-coronavirus-wednesday/index.html

 Although the new coronavirus has been spreading through the United States for months, and there are cities seeing a flattening of the curve, some areas of the country have recently begun to find an uptick of cases.

Some of these hot spots are in states that have just begun allowing businesses to reopen.

In Georgia, Gov. Brian Kemp said the state will open a temporary medical pod in cities such as Gainesville, about an hour northeast of Atlanta.

Gainesville is "being stressed pretty hard ... at the moment," Kemp said Tuesday. The governor mentioned last week that while some areas of the state have seen reduced cases, Gainesville has an increase and area hospitals have had more hospitalizations.

The high number of daily hospitalizations for Covid-19 has continued this week

Overcrowding at Israel's bus stations amid limited seating virus rule

https://www.ynetnews.com/article/r1wjKfrc8

Health orders that demand for busses to carry half the passengers they normally accommodate, resulted in major overcrowding at bus stations as people rushed to get to work after more restrictions had been lifted

 

WHO denies report that China asked org to cover-up coronavirus severity

https://www.jpost.com/international/who-denies-report-that-china-asked-org-to-cover-up-coronavirus-severity-627504

The WHO noted that China confirmed human-to-human transmision on Janurary 20, a day before the purported conversation between Jingping and Ghebreyesus

 

As virus draws closer to him, Trump turns to 2020 and stokes fears about voter fraud

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/10/politics/coronavirus-white-house-trump-2020-voter-fraud/index.html

Throughout the afternoon on Saturday, in an effort to raise concerns among his supporters, he tweeted baseless suspicions about potential voter fraud in both mail-in ballots and in-person voting in a California special congressional election on Tuesday. His focus on vote-counting came two days after he met with political advisers to refine their strategy for mounting aggressive legal challenges to Democratic efforts to shift to vote-by-mail ballots this fall.

 

Health Ministry deputy chief: Second coronavirus wave in summer expected

https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/health-ministry-deputy-prepare-for-second-coronavirus-wave-in-summer-627511

Deputy Director-General of the Health Ministry Itamar Grotto insisted that despite improvements in coronavirus conditions around the country, we must be prepared for a second wave in summer.

 

Reopenings spark new virus flareups as global infection total passes 4 million

https://www.timesofisrael.com/reopenings-spark-new-virus-flareups-as-global-infection-total-passes-4-million/

South Korea, Germany, Italy fret about fresh outbreaks after easing lockdowns; worldwide death toll hits 279,000; New York reports possible virus-linked fatal complications in kids

 

Virus Conspiracists Elevate a New Champion

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/09/technology/plandemic-judy-mikovitz-coronavirus-disinformation.html?action=click&module=Top%20Stories&pgtype=Homepage

A video showcasing baseless arguments by Dr. Judy Mikovits, including attacks on Dr. Anthony Fauci, has been viewed more than eight million times in the past week.

 

Seen 'Plandemic'? We Take A Close Look At The Viral Conspiracy Video's Claims

https://www.npr.org/2020/05/08/852451652/seen-plandemic-we-take-a-close-look-at-the-viral-conspiracy-video-s-claims

 

A slickly produced 26-minute video called Plandemic has exploded on social media in recent days, claiming to present a view of COVID-19 that differs from the "official" narrative.

The video has been viewed millions of times on YouTube via links that are replaced as quickly as the video-sharing service can remove them for violating its policy against "COVID-19 misinformation."

In it, filmmaker Mikki Willis conducts an uncritical interview with Judy Mikovits, who he says has been called "one of the most accomplished scientists of her generation."

Never heard of her? You're not alone.

Two prominent scientists with backgrounds in AIDS research and infectious diseases, who asked not to be identified over concerns of facing a backlash on social media, told NPR that they did not know who she was.

If you were aware of Mikovits before this week, it is probably for two books she published with co-author Kent Heckenlively, one in 2017 and another last month. Heckenlively has also written a book himself espousing the discredited link between autism and the vaccines. You might also know Mikovits for her central role in a pair of scientific controversies. One involves a paper she co-authored in 2009 that was published in the journal Science, and the other concerns allegations that she stole notebooks and a laptop from a laboratory.

Trump and some top aides question accuracy of virus death toll

https://www.axios.com/trump-coronavirus-death-toll-d8ba60a4-316b-4d1e-8595-74970c15fb34.html

President Trump has complained to advisers about the way coronavirus deaths are being calculated, suggesting the real numbers are actually lower — and a number of his senior aides share this view, according to sources with direct knowledge.

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What did China do about early outbreak?

https://www.bbc.com/news/world-52573137

T he US and other countries have raised questions about whether China was fully transparent when the virus first emerged there.

So what do we know about what happened in China, and what did it say and do about the outbreak?

Here's our timeline:

Republicans threaten to sanction Jordan for not extraditing terrorist

https://www.jpost.com/middle-east/republicans-threaten-to-sanction-jordan-for-not-extraditing-terrorist-627444

This signals an increase in pressure on Jordan to extradite Ahlam Al-Tamimi, who facilitated the bombing of a Jerusalem Sbarro restaurant that killed 15 people, including two Americans, in 2001.

Storm builds around Barr over dropping of Flynn case

https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/496895-storm-builds-around-barr-over-dropping-of-flynn-case

Democrats and other critics are seizing on the Department of Justice’s (DOJ) decision to drop the case against former national security adviser Michael Flynn, arguing it shows how heavily politicized it has become under Attorney General William Barr.

Anger over the extraordinary move by Justice to drop charges even after it secured a guilty plea has created a new political storm around Barr, who had previously angered Democrats for his handling of former special counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation

Sweden's death rate from COVID-19 surpasses USA

https://www.9news.com.au/world/coronavirus-sweden-death-toll-covid19-rate-greater-than-usa/2ff8dd35-ecdc-42b8-bc89-5da7736f52cd

 

The Scandinavian nation controversially rejected the stricter lockdown approach of other countries in their strategy to overcome the COVID-19 pandemic, keeping most schools open, as well as stores and restaurants.

According to data from John Hopkins University, now Sweden has a death rate of 297.16 for every 1 million citizens, after 3,040 died from coronavirus. There have been 24,623 confirmed COVID-19 cases and so far 4,074 have recovered.

Comparatively the death rate in the US is 226.33 per 1 million citizens, after 74,239 have passed away from the virus.

In Sweden the lockdown-free approach has seen their death toll far exceed that of their Scandinavian neighbours like Denmark (514), Norway (217) and Finland (255) who have imposed strict measures to try and contain the spread of COVID-19.

‘Playing Russian Roulette’: Nursing Homes Told to Take the Infected

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/04/24/us/nursing-homes-coronavirus.html

California, New Jersey and New York have made nursing homes accept Covid-19 patients from hospitals. Residents and workers fear the policy is risking lives.

Criticized on Virus, Trump Goes to His Playbook: Deflect, Reject and Minimize

https://www.nytimes.com/2020/05/07/us/politics/trump-coronavirus-fact-check.html

The president has served up a series of false and misleading statements as he seeks to counter uncomfortable facts about the spread of Covid-19 and questions about his push to reopen the economy.

 

High Court upholds near one million shekel fine for failure to divorce

https://www.jpost.com/israel-news/high-court-upholds-near-one-million-shekel-fine-for-failure-to-divorce-627117

 The High Court of Justice has upheld a fine of NIS 5,000 a day issued by the Tel Aviv Rabbinical Court against the father of a recalcitrant husband who has refused to give his wife a divorce for over seven years.

The father has been found by the rabbinical court to be the direct cause behind the son’s refusal to grant his wife a divorce leading to the unprecedented fine against someone who is not a litigant in the divorce suit by the court.

Two men involved in fatal shooting of Ahmaud Arbery face murder charges, GBI says

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/07/us/ahmaud-arbery-arrests-mcmichaels/index.html

Gregory McMichael told Glynn County police that Arbery was suspected in "several break-ins," but no such string of crimes was reported in the weeks before the shooting. Police have yet to clarify whether Arbery is accused of any crime at a home that was being built.

In the more than seven weeks preceding the shooting, there was only one burglary report in the neighborhood, said Glynn County police Lt. Cheri Bashlor. A 9 mm pistol was stolen January 1 from an unlocked truck outside the McMichaels' home, she said.

Hydroxychloroquine Fails to Help Coronavirus Patients in Largest Study of the Drug to Date

https://time.com/5833945/hydroxychloroquine-coronavirus-study/

“We don’t think at this point, given the totality of evidence, that it is reasonable to routinely give this drug to patients,” says Schluger. “We don’t see the rationale for doing that.” While the study did not randomly assign people to receive the drug or placebo and compare their outcomes, the large number of patients involved suggests the findings are solid.

 

Observational Study of Hydroxychloroquine in Hospitalized Patients with Covid-19

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMoa2012410

Conclusions

In this observational study involving patients with Covid-19 who had been admitted to the hospital, hydroxychloroquine administration was not associated with either a greatly lowered or an increased risk of the composite end point of intubation or death. Randomized, controlled trials of hydroxychloroquine in patients with Covid-19 are needed. (Funded by the National Institutes of Health.)

 

Justice Department drops criminal case against Michael Flynn

Trump puts political goals above facts in CDC and Flynn dramas

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/07/politics/donald-trump-coronavirus-cdc-michael-flynn-william-barr-russia-investigation/index.html

 President Donald Trump has spent three years discrediting and sidelining institutional sources of facts, truth and trust that threaten his political and personal goals.

Rarely has that mission combined in a single day to such a grave result as it did this week. The White House rejected new Centers for Disease Control and Prevention guidance on safely reopening the country -- with US deaths from the coronavirus surpassing 75,000 -- and the handpicked officials leading the Justice Department dropped charges against former national security adviser Michael Flynn.

Both cases show how Trump disdains government structures meant to dispense independent and fact-based policymaking, science and justice free from corrupting political influences.

Silent hypoxia: Covid-19 patients who should be gasping for air but aren't

https://edition.cnn.com/2020/05/06/health/happy-hypoxia-pulse-oximeter-trnd-wellness/index.html

 In hospitals around the world, doctors are shaking their heads in disbelief as they watch Covid-19 patients who should be comatose or "seizing" from hypoxia -- a lack of oxygen in the body's tissues -- check social media, chat with nurses and barely complain of discomfort while breathing.

 

Some have dubbed them "happy hypoxics," a terrible misnomer for what could be a long, slow recovery -- or worse.

The proper medical term is "silent hypoxia." It happens when people are unaware they are being deprived of oxygen and are therefore showing up to the hospital in much worse health than they realize.

Typically, these patients have experienced some Covid-19 symptoms for two to seven days before they show up at the hospital complaining of sudden chest tightness or an inability to breathe deeply, said Dr. Richard Levitan, who's been an emergency room physician for some 30 years.

 

There he watched patients come into the emergency room with blood oxygen levels as low as 50%, so low they should have been incoherent, even unconscious. Normal blood oxygen saturation is between 95% and 100%, and anything below 90% is considered abnormal.

 

 

"We found two out of three patients can avoid a ventilator during the first 24 hours by putting them on oxygen and doing these positioning maneuvers, such as laying them prone on their stomach," he said.

Republicans praise Trump's pandemic response with Senate majority at risk

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/06/senate-republicans-trump-coronavirus-response-240454

Senate Republicans are settling on their pandemic message as they fight to save their majority: President Donald Trump did a tremendous job.

The coronavirus has killed more than 70,000 Americans, tanked the once-soaring U.S. economy and shows no signs of abating. And Trump’s ineffective leadership is largely to blame, say Democrats who are growing optimistic they can seize the Senate after being relegated to the minority for six years.

After POLITICO reported that candidates received a memo instructing them to blame China and not defend Trump on the coronavirus, the Senate GOP campaign arm publicly rejected the strategy and made clear that Republicans are sticking with the president.

Trump boosters: Don’t believe the coronavirus death toll

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/07/trump-death-toll-coronavirus-241819

 

More than 70,000 Americans have died from the coronavirus — if you believe the government.

An increasing number of conservatives are convinced the medical community and the media are inflating the coronavirus death toll for political purposes, despite nearly all evidence indicating that, if anything, the figure is an undercount. 

Young said conservatives were more likely to distrust outlets running with the death toll offered by leading researchers.

“Why would a conservative, Republican, or Trump supporter, after seeing those consistent left-leaning commentary decisions, continue to view that source as unbiased and trustworthy?” he said.

Politics aside, Lobelo said the factor driving people’s suspicion of the models “all boils down to uncertainty.”

“The scientists are used to uncertainty because that's how we operate. That's part of the scientific premise of trial and error until you have a better understanding of the complex issue,” he said. “But for regular day-to-day people, uncertainty is more difficult to tolerate.”

The doctor making Trump queasy

https://www.politico.com/news/2020/05/07/world-health-organization-tedros-adhanom-ghebreyesus-242030

As head of the World Health Organization, Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus has achieved what he set out to accomplish: injecting politics into public health and casting it as “a political choice.”

With the coronavirus crisis, the former Ethiopian foreign minister who took over the WHO in 2017 has got far more than he bargained for.

 Now, as Tedros leads the global response to a worldwide pandemic in an age of rising nationalism and shifting world order, his message is: "Please don't politicize this virus.”

With the death toll mounting and the economic costs of lockdowns beginning to bite, he finds himself caught between two of the United Nations health agency’s most powerful members.

One, the United States, is the WHO’s biggest single source of cash. The other, China, is a major supplier of the medical equipment and machinery that will be needed to bring economies back online. It’s also the original epicenter of the pandemic — and thus key to understanding the virus that’s brought the globe to its knees.