Gain of Function Pandemic – The Movie

"Gain of Function? Nooit van gehoord". Als welgeïnformeerde krantenlezers dat zeggen, besef ik weer dat ik in een parallel universum leef. Niet dat het een levensvoorwaarde is om te weten wat 'Gain of Function onderzoek' is maar het kan wel als graadmeter dienen van hoe ingevoerd je bent. Natuurlijk ken je het overheidsnarratief en de rivm-dogma's. Maar helemaal niets weten over aanvullende cq andere ideeën of alternatief gedachtegoed, dat doet mij denken aan van Dissel die nooit van 5G-theorieën heeft gehoord of niet weet dat carnaval een virusverspreidend festijn is. Je mist invalshoeken, zowel zinnige als onzinnige.

From hypothesis to reality

Die "Gain-of-Function" of "Lab Leak" theorie stelt dat het virus in een laboratorium is gekweekt. Dat was al vroeg een wappie-theorie. Het diende toen vooral als bewijs van een complottheorie waarin het virus doelbewust zou zijn ontwikkeld om het 'plan' uit te rollen waar we nu middenin zitten: beknotting van individuele vrijheden, totalitaire elementen in overheidsdenken en zo alle macht samenbundelen in kleine elites, van monetair tot Big Tech, inclusief het drastisch verminderen van het aantal mensen op aarde om, heel 'woke', het klimaat te redden.

However, the idea that the virus comes from a lab is gaining ground, even outside of Conspiracy. In fact, I'm tempted to say there's no getting away from it. As more becomes known, plausibility increases. If you still think it's a hopeless conspiracy theory, take the time to this long piece by Nicholas Wade to read. Nick has worked for Nature,Scienceand many years before theNew York Times. He digs it out and shows what points in that direction. I don't summarize it because if you list the key points without context and evidence -if available- then it is hard to believe.

Who cares, GoF or not?

Why are people so obsessed with the origin of the virus? To what extent is it interesting where that virus comes from? Americans want someone to be sued, I know that. Trump took pleasure in blaming the Chinese, reducing credibility for the story. It will be satisfying for many if a scapegoat has to pay, but how can an individual, institution or country ever provide reparation for all that has been done? And even then: you don't solve the current problem with it. If you know the origin you can hopefully prevent it from happening again, but you don't hang the baked pears back on the tree with it.

There is also a call for a tribunal because it is an international, even global affair. Perhaps I don't know enough about that because I thought that a tribunal was always about the crimes of the losing governments, apparently committed in vain on the winning side. Usually it is about winning countries against other losing countries, that is clear. That means that if the other side had won, the roles in that court would have been exactly reversed.

This raises fundamental questions: who will be the winners here, who will be the losers? Who can put the democratically elected parliaments of just about every country in the world in a dock? How can citizens organise a tribunal against the people who represent them? Or will the indictment be limited to a small circle of boosters? In short: I am very curious how Reiner Fuellmich will approach this.

A scenario that answers questions

Why I have come to find the Gain-of-Function debate interesting is that this 'narrative' (because that is what it is: a coherent story) can be a supporting explanation for the incomprehensible hyperreaction of the WHO, the NHI (National Health Institute), Fauci and the institutions and governments collaborating with them.

The Lab Leak theory seems like fodder for conspiracy scenarios, but it is the opposite: conspiracy scenarios are consigned to the realm of fables. At Lab Leak, an accident and the hysterical attempts to cover it up are the cause of the misery. That is really something different from virus spread as the first step of a preconceived plan by a power-hungry elite.

Synopsis

Spoiler alert: it looks like a movie script.

[Read the updated version ]

Some scientific health institutes, at least American, maintain politically undesirable ties with China in order to continue research that is very difficult to do in the West. The Obama administration banned Gain of Function (GoF) research in America, after which they went to China for (debatable?) virus research, the Wuhan Institute of Virology. In GoF research, for example, ferrets are used to increase the infectiousness and/or lethality of viruses. (Not surprisingly, ferret farms had to be culled because the virus was bred for infectiousness among rodents. Does that sound improbably conspiratorial again? Then I refer again to this piece by Nicholas Wade.)

A sudden local serious flu wave in Wuhan attracts attention. The Chinese quickly recognize the virus in question. All alarm bells are going off. Not only with regard to the health risks, but also for keeping the GoF investigation and the American-Chinese cooperation in it under the radar. After all, the virus bears characteristics of what people were doing in Wuhan. That's wrong. This must be suppressed immediately and ruthlessly at all costs. Fauci is notified, and he starts emailing around.

Consultation and panic, how do we keep this under the radar? Containment is necessary so that the virus cannot spread further: Wuhan goes into lockdown. In order to control the Wuhan virus, one must also know where it is located, otherwise the project will still leak out. So: if the weeds put together a test. But how do you explain afterwards that you already knew it was a SARS virus? Just, look on twitter:

"Before public release of virus sequences from cases of 2019-nCoV, we relied on social media reports announcing detection of a SARS-like virus. We thus assumed that a SARS-related CoV is involved in the outbreak."

(source: justification of the RT-PCR test of a.o. Koopmans and Drosten) Sounds solid, doesn't it?

Trump will hear it. In a recorded phone conversation with Bob Woodward in February 2020, he says: "It goes through the air. That’s always tougher than the touch. You don’t have to touch things. Right? But the air, you just breathe the air and that’s how it’s passed. And so that’s a very tricky one. That’s a very delicate one. It’s also more deadly than even your strenuous flus. This is deadly stuff.” [Later zal Trump het virus publiekelijk downplayen. Misschien was hij pas later gebriefd over de Amerikaanse betrokkenheid.] Bron: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/sep/09/trump-bob-woodward-book-rage-coronavirus

Everything must be done to stop this virus or the entire GoF operation will be exposed - which now appears to be happening. The entire top virologists are mobilized. Convulsive, ruthless. Research partners (WHO, NHI) are involved, as well as Imperial College, the self-proclaimed 'favorite research partner' of the Chinese. They promise to stimulate things a bit, because for a serious but fairly common flu virus, it obviously makes no sense to tackle it so draconian.

To justify the urgency, the lethality of the virus is presented twenty times as serious. Pharmaceutical companies are approached confidentially, they can already get started with a vaccine (the basic tool of the WHO) before there is even a pandemic. If I were a pharmacist, I would negotiate a purchase guarantee, even if an effective drug turns up. And a waiver because I can't follow my normal research protocol.

No one could have realized what all that would mean. The dynamics that were set in motion would surpass any fantasy. The mass psychosis, the collective hysteria, the agony among scientists that makes it impossible to think soberly. It all got completely out of hand.

I can imagine a Netflix production with worried honest researchers, administrators who always go a step further, manipulation, industrialists who make deals, etc. The tension-enhancing pressure of interest that we know from series about drug cartels pales in comparison to what is at stake here. Never seen before.

They're probably already writing in Hollywood.

We hadden het kunnen weten 😉