This week, Boston University found itself at the centre of scorn over claims its laboratories were engineering a “SARS-CoV-3” virus that would (hypothetically) put humanity one lab-leak away from a renewed Covid pandemic.
In the midst of worldwide relief over SARS-CoV-2’s eventual replacement by the mild, ‘common cold’ Omicron variant, BU’s scientists have created de novo an “Omicron S-bearing virus”, potentially marrying Omicron’s transmissibility with the Wuhan strain’s dangerous pathogenicity.
Boston University leadership should not be shocked by the widespread condemnation of this experiment. It has its own hubris to blame: steamrolling neighbourhood opposition to the urban placement of America’s National Emerging Infectious Diseases Laboratories (NEIDL), through which BU amasses lucrative research grants. As the philosopher Spider-Man has said, “with great power, there must also come great responsibility.”
In this case, BU exhibits power, but avoids responsibility. The National Institutes of Health (NIH) is examining whether these experiments should have triggered a federal review as ‘gain of function’ with SARS CoV-2’s gaining new or enhanced abilities, which NIH deems “inherently risky”. Boston University says it “did not have an obligation to disclose this research”, despite having received federal NIAID funding which BU states was only for “tools and platforms” used by the scientists.
“We take our safety and security of how we handle pathogens seriously, and the virus does not leave the laboratory,” noted NEIDL’s Dr. Ronald Corley. Cynics might point out that as recently as 2018, the Wuhan Institute of Virology (WIV) touted that its work “held the secret to preventing epidemics”. NEIDL has (probably) released fewer unintentional pandemics than WIV, so there’s that.
NEIDL can be seen as either a bulwark against – or conversely, a conduit for – bioterrorism. NEIDL houses the Level-3 Biosafety Lab (BSL-3) of this trans-viral graft experiment as well as one of the rare US BSL-4 laboratories, intended for studying the deadliest transmissible diseases, such as Ebola.
Lab-coat scientist researchers are not selected or rewarded for political acumen, nor should they be. Actual wet-lab work often embodies the phrase by which physicians tease anesthesiologists: “99% boredom and 1% panic” – but, without the panic. Instead, researchers have their 1%-portion comprised of the brief, refreshing glory on the occasion of publishing consequential results – the news of which usually stays within a small coterie of PhDs cognisant of the technical ‘twin-speak‘ pertinent to the narrow focus of the experiment performed.
Upending the news cycle, bringing fear and then furor to a Covid-weary populace, and a posse of paparazzi upon itself is not the usual modus operandi of researchers releasing a preprint dryly titled (as they often are): “Role of spike in the pathogenic and antigenic behavior of SARS-CoV-2 BA.12 Omicron“. Boston University’s Mohsan Saeed (et al.) ‘buried the lede‘ by not communicating clearly having formed a SARS-CoV-2 mutant through chimeric graft of Omicron spike onto SARS CoV-2.
The researchers’ insularity is evident in their not predicting that producing novel camouflage for the pandemic’s perpetrator would be sufficient cause for all hell to break loose. Given Dr. Saeed’s interim disappearance from the scene, it is assumed notoriety was not the researchers’ actual intent. His additional lack of communicating the societal need for a rejiggering of COVID-19 spare parts into a new mutant strain is its own problem.
NIAID says that the BU should have communicated in advance the purpose and nature of the study. BU responds that it did not have to because the primary funds were from BU itself. Medical ethicist Dr. Arthur Caplan says, “the entire research community would benefit from better communication.” Perhaps even earlier “better communication” might have obviated the experiment itself.
By focusing so intently within the micro-world, it’s perhaps forgivable virologists lose sense of the macro. Conversely, the general public has earned every right to be twitchy and tetchy over ‘gain of function’ engineered augmentations to SARS-CoV-2 after the many millions of excess deaths following what many suspect was a Wuhan lab leak.
The Daily Mail’s story headlined “‘This is playing with fire – it could spark a lab-generated pandemic’” had this graphic stating the mutant strain has an 80% kill rate.
Sensationalism definitionally entails shocking language at the expense of accuracy. Corrections are therefore in order:
- Yes, this lab is performing a ‘Frankenstein’s monster’ experiment: putting Omicron’s spike protein (head) on ancestral SARS CoV-2’s envelope (body) – but, this is the standard operating procedure for virologists. Chimeric work allows comparisons to be made gauging the relative strength or pathogenicity of individual virion segments.
- Yes, this is a brand-new ‘deadly strain’ – but for a particularly and purposefully vulnerable strain of mice, not for humans. The new ‘Frankenstein’ Omicron-spike-and-Wuhan-body chimeric coronavirus caused 80% of hACE-2 lab mice to die – fewer, actually, than had perished from the ancestral Wuhan SARS-CoV-2 itself. For better or worse, these mice have been specifically genetically engineered to have 100% fatality to SARS-CoV-2. If the mice instead replicated human’s very low fatality rate against this virus (less than 0.1% in the non-vulnerable), it would be nigh impossible to make any statistically significant judgements in any experiment unless multi-thousands of mice were included in every phase.
This specific type of work was performed in an appropriate BSL-3 laboratory, and was technically legal even it encompassed ‘gain of function‘ work. There had been a moratorium in the mid-2010s on such potentially dangerous work within the United States, but that was repealed in 2017. The rationale for reversing the moratorium was similar to that of any military’s maintaining and testing weaponry and engaging in wargames: “Researchers deliberately make viruses more dangerous to help prepare better responses to outbreaks that might occur naturally.”
Ostensibly, the moratorium was lifted to keep us safe; however, it was instituted for the very same reason, in 2014, to curtail scientists’ juicing up avian flu.
In 2011, Fouchier and Kawaoka alarmed the world by revealing they had modified the deadly avian H5N1 influenza virus so that it spread between ferrets (animals used for their similarity to humans’ influenza response). Critics worried a souped-up virus could spark a pandemic if it escaped from a lab (accidentally or as bioterror).
The flip-flopping in allowing gain of function research points to the dual needs in relation to such cutting edge science. Even as the moratorium was lifted, there were rules about the flow of information on gain of function experiments. Open communication is a prerequisite to scientific innovation but also can provide ready blueprints for any intrepid bioterrorist. An additional complication is that almost every study in the U.S. receives federal funds, creating a loophole of having to divulge sensitive results through any given FOIA request.
It is uncertain if BU’s newly chimeric COVID-19 mutant could qualify as a bio threat. Personally, I think not. Almost every one of its mutations is less efficacious than the parent. Viruses go through trillions in order to adapt sequentially to changing immune systems amongst the host. That researchers would come up with a highly dangerous one on the first try seems unlikely. In any event, there is vast natural immunity to Omicron and natural and vaccine immunity to ancestral SARS-CoV-2, COVID-19.
So what was the purpose of the BU NEIDL team? Since poor communication seems to be a thread throughout this story, it is perhaps no surprise that this preprint’s abstract section lacks clarity – and features instances of ‘begging the question’.
The recently identified, globally predominant SARS-CoV-2 Omicron variant (BA.1) is highly transmissible, even in fully vaccinated individuals, and causes attenuated disease compared with other major viral variants recognised to date. The Omicron spike (S) protein, with an unusually large number of mutations, is considered the major driver of these phenotypes. We generated chimeric recombinant SARS-CoV-2 encoding the S gene of Omicron in the backbone of an ancestral SARS-CoV-2 isolate and compared this virus with the naturally circulating Omicron variant. The Omicron S-bearing virus robustly escapes vaccine-induced humoral immunity, mainly due to mutations in the receptor binding motif (RBM), yet unlike naturally occurring Omicron, efficiently replicates in cell lines and primary-like distal lung cells. In K18-hACE2 mice, while Omicron causes mild, non-fatal infection, the Omicron S-carrying virus inflicts severe disease with a mortality rate of 80%. This indicates that while the vaccine escape of Omicron is defined by mutations in S, major determinants of viral pathogenicity reside outside of S.
Let’s translate the abstract into general English:
Omicron is milder – and its spike protein is structurally different enough from the ancestral Wuhan strains that an mRNA vaccine to SARS CoV-2 does nothing to protect mice from Omicron. This is somewhat immaterial because Omicron doesn’t make these mice sick in the first place (basically the same situation as with humans). So, with research funding in hand, what are we going to do? Let’s put an Omicron ‘Halloween mask’ on the dangerous Wuhan strain! How many mice will die? A lot, nearly 80%. That’s sounds really bad, but we forgot to mention (in this abstract) that Wuhan strain without the Omicron-spike mask kills 100% of these mice, which sadly are canaries in a coal mine, engineered to die from SARS-CoV-2. Conclusion: the stuff inside the SARS-CoV-2 envelope is the really bad stuff. With its very own original spike protein it’s more dangerous, but what did we expect? We just made a virus that’s different from a fairly dangerous one and it’s not quite as dangerous.
Thus restated, it becomes difficult to ascertain the genuine need for doing this experiment (whose results seem obvious, predictable and axiomatic). Einstein favored Gedankenexperimente (‘thought experiments’) using conceptual rather than actual experiments in creating the theory of relativity. There’s nothing like the ‘real thing’, but I’m imagining 99% of virologists could have foreseen a conclusion similar to this without having done any of the study. Moreover, most would not have seen a real point in doing this study in the first place. Of course, getting paid and churning research grants can help provide motivation.
Even without the researchers’ having read my own article “Is it Time to Accept That Omicron is not COVID-19?” in The Daily Sceptic, September 25, 2022 – they should still have had enough information to know Omicron (despite its Greek letter) is not a SARS CoV-2 variant nor lineal genomic or genetic descendent. Such information was easily available January 2022. With this in mind, the highlighted portions make little sense and the purpose of the study even less.
One virologist offered these criticisms of the preprint’s study (in confidence):
- Why put Omicron S on a virus that is no longer circulating? I’m not sure what scientific question they are trying to answer.
- The grants that are cited for the work were meant to study innate immunity. They claim they want to study the role of spike protein in phenotype but they are not using the proper controls.
- It would have made more sense to have reversed the experiment, i.e., put the Wuhan spike on the Omicron envelope.
- Also, site-directed mutagenesis (creating specific, targeted changes) would have been a more useful technique, given that there are so many mutations in Omicron’s spike protein compared to earlier variants.
- The authors’ conclusion, “These findings indicate that the S protein is not the primary determinant of Omicron’s pathogenicity in K18-hACE2 mice,” should say that “S protein was not a primary determinant of Wuhan pathogenicity”.
- They actually [downwardly] attenuate the Wuhan strain by putting the Omicron-S onto that virus, yet try to sell it as if they had made the virus more lethal.
- Overall, they seem to really be studying Wuhan pathogenicity in the context of Omicron spike.
All products and methods of technology (e.g. nuclear power, mining, fossil fuels) are variously considered ‘double-edged swords’. So too it is with these studies. There are potential benefits and potential risks. In this particular case, were the risks worth it? Was the study appropriately directed and was the information gleaned worth the global consternation? The answer to both is ‘no’.
“It’s not like they made this monster virus, that’s a complete misinterpretation,” states infectious disease specialist Dr. Daniel Kuritzkes. “Researchers compared the ancestral version, Omicron, and a combined version of the two to research what piece of the virus dictates how sick a person will get. What we see in animal models does not translate directly to what we will see in humans. The labs are extraordinarily careful in how they do these experiments. There are strict protocols in place to make sure that nothing produced in the lab is released into the environment.”
My assessment is that this is more ‘tempest in a teapot’ than monster – although Dr. Frankenstein’s methods and ethical issues find resonance here. That there is a federal investigation into this case is interesting for the side reason that it seems an admission against its own interest, namely to the possibility that virology laboratories can potentially leak mutant strains. Who would’ve thought? For so long, it was all but forbidden to consider such a possibility for China’s WIV, even though ancillary evidence is nearly conclusive it occurred.
Dr. Randall Bock is a primary care physician near Boston, Massachusetts, and the author of Overturning Zika. Read his blog and follow him on Twitter.
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Fortunately I don’t subscribe to Netflix or else I’d be force to cancel.
Mmmm… first there is this:
Netflix is making the move after the U.S. Disease Control and Prevention announced earlier this week that masks will once again have to be worn indoors even by people who have been fully vaccinated.
… and then there is this:
In the U.S., JP Morgan said in June that it would instruct staff to log their vaccination status on an internal web portal, with fully-jabbed employees being allowed to discard face masks at work.
The US is a very litigious country. Surely all it will take will be a successful lawsuit for damages caused by this policy. I guess that then if they change it so that people do NOT have to be jabbed, they will get people who get a Covid infection suing them for that. Oh what a pickle.
The onus should be on the jabbed and those pushing the vaccines, that aren’t vaccines, to prove that the work. That won’t be easy and is likely impossible.
They don’t work, breakthrough cases everywhere. Immunity waning after six weeks? Oh dear what a disaster for the health authorities and gov’ts that pushed this stuff like it was heroin.
More like a gherkin
The solution to this, I think, might be Sinovac. Sure, it’s not terribly effective, but it is a traditional vaccine and so maybe it’s a bit safer. Because China has the WHO in their pocket and everyone in the world wants to get Chinese tourists back into their equivalent of Bicester Village… I’m sure that it’ll be widely accepted as a vaccine for the vaccine passports even if it is only a little better than saline solution at preventing COVID-19.
The UK version is Valneva which seems to be heading for approval on the 12th of Never .
In the UK I don’t think there is anyway of getting Sinovac or Sinopharm
We know from SARS and MERS that using whole inactivated virus causes ADE, in animal trials at least, leading to the abandonment of the trials.
We have cheap, generic drugs that prevent and treat Covid. We don’t need more vaccines, we need a complete shift in government policy.
The one most likely to cause ADE you mean? And yes, I do think the Chinese are probably giving their citizens saline, unless your credit score is too low, in which case you probably get the real McCoy.
or jabbing politicians in the face with fists until they decide they’ve had enough nudging.
This has nothing to do with vaccines and ALL TO DO WITH SURVEILLANCE. They’re taking our freedoms away can’t you see that? Don’t do it, don’t comply and don’t consent.
exactly, it’s never been about the virus or the “vaccines”… people should care as much about their freedoms as they do about football…
Britain participated in the tests, study of Novovax. You will see it here soon. Dr. Peter McCullough suggests it is the lesser of all other vax evils.
But they won’t let you choose which one you get will they?
Public/private employer insists workers are fully “vaccinated” before returning to work – “m’kay, here’s an letter of acceptance of liability for harm and/or death if my employer makes it mandatory to be vaccinated using an EUA”
Then just wait. Don’t quit, wait until they terminate. Then litigate. 100% of businesses would collapse with an immediate reduction in staff of 5-15%. Walk. Call their bluff.
Yes indeed. Employers and others pushing these experimental products should be asked by employees etc to sign a watertight legal contract to the effect that if vaccine damage occurs then they will pay compensation to the injured or their heirs. As they tell you that the “vaccines” are so safe, they should have no problem here and the compensation levels can then be very high. Say death at a minimum figure of $5 or $10 millions plus all legal costs, but whatever, just name your own figure if you are worth more more. Watch their reaction, but make sure you have a good solicitor check over the documentation over first.
Perhaps a like minded Solicitor/lawyer could draw up a standard form contract that employees could present to their employer which provides the necessary comfort and protection. As you say if Companies and whilst we are at it why limit it to companies why not the Public sector employers and government, are so confident that the product is so safe that they make it a condition of employment they will have no fear in covering unlimited damages from death,or side effects resulting from the injection, or indeed if the injected still manages to catchj Covid post injection and is off work as a result. Any lawyer on this site willing to offer a public service?
Such a thing is already freely available.
Here you go – https://remeece.com/letters
Brilliant, thank you.
Here are the US equivalents of the UK documents I posted above:
https://americasfrontlinedoctors.org/legal/vaccines-the-law/
It is more than about time the legal profession got involved in the cancellation of our freedoms. Let’s have one lawyer publish a legal document that is airtight for anyone who would like to use it at their place of employment. It cannot be that hard.
A vaccination (or other medical reason) would be administered under the Health & Safety At Work Act 1974 and supported by a risk assessment conducted iaw the Management of Health & Safety at Work Regulations. The Risk Assessment must show that there is a credible risk in the workplace of from a pathogen and that a medical intervention is a reasonably practicable and proportionate risk control measure. The company must then assume liability for any downside (i.e. death) to the control measure.
The company should also check with their insurer if they are covered if against any side effects of the medical procedure that they are forcing their employee to undertake. I would a guess that they’re not, which would make the company directors personally liable.
Any side effects are potentially reportable under Reporting of Injuries, Diseases and Dangerous Occurances Regulations (RIDDOR).
Oh what a tangled web.
https://www.market-ticker.org/akcs-www?post=243051
Ah that magic juice – only works if everyone has it. Everything about this propagandemic is novel isn’t it?
The virus is magically capable of significant levels of asymptomatic spread
Masks only work against this magic virus – but not for other respiratory infections
It’s so magic we need lockdowns, but not for flu
It magically stays on surfaces – even touching something is very dangerous
It’s like Voldemort this virus – capable of some great dark magic. There’s biology, chemistry and physics – and then there’s covid.
I cancelled my subscription when they paid a fortune to Prince and Princess woke of L.A.
pleased i did, I will now be forwarding this particular article on to all of my humane friends and asking them to unsubscribe.
sums it all up
Ultimate twisted irony that Penn is working on a show called ‘Gaslit’ while he plays vicious bullying games on his victims. This is moral idiocy personified.
The magnificently virtuous Matt Damon gives a heart rending message about his frustrations with covid vaccine hesitancy.
“I have a couple friends who are immunocompromised, and they can’t get the vaccine, so they have no choice but to rely on the rest of us to do our part to get herd immunity. So I look at it that way.”
Yes, and what is he going to do when his poor immunocompromised friends are refused jobs/restaurant entry because they *can’t* have the vaccine? Idiot
I hereby give a message about my frustation with idiocy: If someone’s immunocomprised every pathogen is a grave danger to him. A common cold will kill people whose immune system doesn’t stop it first. That’s how people with AIDS used to die: Their immune systems progessively weakened until they caught a disease generally considered to be perfectly harmless and died from the consequences.
Sars-CoV2 is not a dangerous novelty on a planet which used to be a safe space before 2020. If these friend are older than 18 months, they must have been able to cope with this somehow.
You would hope the unvaccinated would be asking for their accounts to be terminated en masse.
Given the US uptake is only 50% they could lose a lot of subscribers.
Time for some politicians to step up to the plate and encourage their voters to escape these plantations?
I haven’t used Netflix for a long time but i’ll be contacting them later to get my account permanently removed.
Get your data deleted too.
Actors and the generally left wing film studios types are probably in vast majority jabbed twice. Once they have to come for their booster shots the rules will be relaxed.
Gaslit. Oh, the irony.
In plain sight?
“In June, Harry Potter publisher Bloomsbury said staff must have vaccinations ahead of their return to the workplace.
“The simple fact is that this virus is still extremely dangerous,” it said.”
The simple fact is that the jabs don’t stop people catching or transmitting the virus! Vaccine passports are, thus, irrational.
Very interesting interview with Dr Robert Malone (MRNA inventor) yesterday.
https://rumble.com/vkfz1v-the-vaccine-causes-the-virus-to-be-more-dangerous.html
What else would one expect from the vile Penn?!
Sean Penn, pint sized prick.
Netflix announce George Martin has written Game of Jabs, to be released in 2022.
“Gaslit”- how ironic!
Modern entertainment is rubbish
Biden’s WAR on America: Target the nation’s “human infrastructure” with mandatory, deadly gene therapy injections to mass murder all those who keep the country running
https://www.naturalnews.com/2021-07-28-bidens-war-on-america-target-the-nations-human-infrastructure-with-mandatory-injections.html
Stand in South Hill Park Bracknell every Sunday from 10am meet fellow anti lockdown freedom lovers, keep yourself sane, make new friends and have a laugh.
Join our Stand in the Park – Bracknell – Telegram Group
http://t.me/astandintheparkbracknell
Modern entertainment is rubbish
Biden’s WAR on America: Target the nation’s “human infrastructure” with mandatory, deadly gene therapy injections to mass murder all those who keep the country running
https://www.naturalnews.com/2021-07-28-bidens-war-on-america-target-the-nations-human-infrastructure-with-mandatory-injections.html
Stand in South Hill Park Bracknell every Sunday from 10am meet fellow anti lockdown freedom lovers, keep yourself sane, make new friends and have a laugh.
Join our Stand in the Park – Bracknell – Telegram Group
http://t.me/astandintheparkbracknell
Better reason not to buy a book published by Bloomsbury or watch anything produced by Netflix – god awful stuff that passes for culture – just watched 1956 film ‘The Harder They Fall’ on https://archive.org/details/movies?tab=collection brilliant free archive – the film is based on a Budd Schulberg novel – brilliant book. There’s culture and culture and Sean Penn et al. don’t cut it.
Will be cancelling my subscription to Netflix.
The Nuremberg Trials specifically went after corporations.. IG Farben was found to be the worst offender and was split into Bayer, BASF etc…
And there was me thinking that Sean Penn was some sort of free-thinking rebel and ‘hey presto!’ He’s not. I like his performances, he’s a good actor, but at the end of the day, he’s just an actor and actors act, sometimes even when they’re not acting. So maybe all this ‘rebel’ stuff was just a big ‘act’. Won’t stop me watching his films but has somewhat diminished his standing in my eyes.
In thew words of Ewan McGregor on being an actor “I wear make up for a living”… nuff said.
Oh bugger. Another thing to have to cancel….
Dear Sean Penn, honestly, who do you think gives a flying duck? Please feel free to get jabbed as much as you like, I’m about as interested in you as I am in watching paint dry! Do or don’t return to the set, for goodness sake we don’t care….it’s not important and neither are you or your opinions!
One of the marvellous things that might come out of this shitshow is that ‘celebrities’, whether they be actors, comedians or entertainers, and who I’ve managed to do without for eighteen months (and who genuinely I haven’t missed!) will never regain their former popularity. I know they won’t with me…
He’s pathetic. Behaving like a truculent child ….but then is an actor so no surprise.
Boy oh boy we are going to see unemployment hit the roof as governments and now private industry are mandateding experimental biologicals that don’t even work
.