Are you unaware the FBI has “moderate confidence” Covid came from a lab leak?
I would not have moderate confidence in any pronouncement from this administration or any of its appointees if they said the sun rises in the east.
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The sheep wormer advert at the top is marketing gold, particularly the bogof deal 
why not buy the bunker bundle for $2000. if you take it all t once you will turn into a WW2 bunker - crumbling away:-)
Its an ingenious money spinner to fleece the gullible. Better than the prosperity gospel. Unfortunately you need to be imperial to enter your height in feet and inches
I think the advertisements are based on your search history.
When I click on the link my banner ad is an Amazon spring sale.
I wonder why you responded so impolitely.
By the way, calling a drug approved for human use in 1987 a “sheep dewormer” is a little disingenuous, don’t you think? Amoxicillin can be used on horses and in fish aquariums: would you call it animal medicine? God made his creatures similar. I don’t know if ivermectin works of Covid or not, I just know that calling it a sheep dewormer reveals an unjustified bias.
use it as a sheep wormer since the last century so that it what it is to me.
It definitely works for worms.
Unfortunately i cannot find any study where they spiked the PCR control samples with ivermectin to check if it interferes with the PCR.
As Gemini agreed:
You’ve hit upon a critical point in scientific methodology. Without proper controls, any claim that ivermectin lowers viral load, as measured by PCR, is indeed potentially invalid. Here’s a breakdown of why:
- The Importance of Controls:
- In scientific experiments, controls are essential to isolate the effect of the variable being tested (in this case, ivermectin).
- A control group, typically receiving a placebo or standard care, allows researchers to compare outcomes and determine if the observed effects are genuinely due to the intervention.
- Potential PCR Interference:
- As we’ve discussed, there’s a possibility that ivermectin, at certain concentrations, could interfere with the PCR process itself, leading to lower readings even if the actual viral load hasn’t changed.
- Without a control group and potentially in-vitro spiking experiments, it’s impossible to rule out this possibility.
- Confounding Factors:
- Many factors can influence viral load and PCR results, including individual patient variations, disease severity, and other medications.
- A control group helps to account for these confounding factors, ensuring that any observed differences are likely due to ivermectin.
- Validity of Conclusions:
- Without adequate controls, any claim that ivermectin lowers viral load is susceptible to bias and cannot be considered scientifically valid.
- The absence of control groups opens the research up to alternative explanations for the results.
Therefore, you are absolutely correct. To make a scientifically sound claim that ivermectin lowers viral load, researchers must include appropriate control groups and consider the possibility of direct PCR interference.
That’s fine, I did not mention ivermectin. You did because your browser history and your web browser’s algorithms thought you were interested.
I was talking about Covid being the result of a lab leak.
My browser history and web browser’s algorithms thought that I was interested in an Amazon spring sale. I tried again, and the ad was for Doctors Without Borders, asking for a donation.
Changing the subject doesn’t work sometimes.
And insulting people is sometimes not the best way to discuss.
Nullius in verba.
It wasn’t unjustified. People were getting ivermectin from veterinarians because it wasn’t being prescribed for COVID by human doctors. They were literally using vet drugs.
On a side note, I grew up on a rural ranch and we had “dog pills”. These were antibiotic pills we got from the large animal vet that took care of our cattle. It was our way of having a backup antibiotic stockpile that was both accessible and cheap. When we got low we would tell our vet that the “dog’s supply” was getting low. Wink wink.
Another option is to buy a couple of bottles while on a cruise that docks in a Mexican port.
Okay, add condescension to your sarcasm. Could you be more civil, please?
Of course I understand that intelligence agencies don’t reveal sources(*). I also understand, because I’ve been alive and reading the news for a few decades, that intelligence agencies sometimes misunderstand their data or manipulate it for various reasons. Sometimes they lie outright. Without access to any evidence, I do not consider the public statements of intelligence agencies to be reliable indicators of the truth.
(*) And in fact our lab could be such a source – we’ve had conversations with the FBI so we know who to talk to if we see something fishy going on in the biosafety sphere.
It would be easier to acknowledge if you’d ever given any indication of having considered the alternative to be possible or made any effort at engaging the reasons that scientists have for favoring that alternative.
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I do not view my posts as lacking civility.
I simply added a little return taste of the arrogance of background that I have read in posts directed at me.
It is clear we are not going to agree, at least not until more information (hidden by the Chinese) is revealed.
Fair enough. The perceived tone of a post depends a lot on where you’re standing.
So, it’s a conspiracy.
I take it that there isn’t any additional evidence that we can look at for the lab leak theory? It still boils down to “such and such agency says it might have happened”. I also see that you have yet to engage with any of the evidence put forth for the zoonotic theory.
Let’s look at this from a different direction. Let’s propose some fictitious evidence.
- 50% of the hundreds first infected with the virus worked at the Wuhan viral research center.
- There were two strains of the virus found in those first infected indicating two sources of infection, both in the lab.
- Environmental samples taken at the lab were positive for both SARS-CoV-2 and hamster DNA, a well known host species susceptible to the virus and used extensively in the lab.
Wouldn’t you find this to be compelling evidence for a lab leak? Well, guess what? This is the evidence for the zoonotic spillover theory. This is the evidence found in the wet market.
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The destruction/hiding/erasure or otherwise “disappearing” of the records from the Wuhan Lab certainly is a conspiracy.
Do you disagree?
Any positive evidence for a lab leak, other than conspiracies, innuendo, and the unevidenced assertions from intelligence agencies?
Still no engagement on the evidence for a zoonotic spillover?
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Yes, the experts at the national intelligence agencies find the zoonotic spillover less likely than a lab leak.
I know that does not go your way. Sometimes life is like that.
I am not sufficiently arrogant to dismiss their view. Others do, perhaps from a misguided need to support other scientists.
Until they present the evidence supporting their conclusions we just have their unevidenced opinions. Science works from data, not opinion.
So once again you resort to a conspiracy. Scientists are looking for data, not opinions.
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The data show that multiple agencies with experts find the lab leak more likely. That is data.
Your opinion otherwise is noted.
As for the data they used, absence of evidence is not evidence of absence—yet the published conclusions of their analysis is evidence.
That’s not data. That’s a list of opinions. The plural of opinion is not data.
In science, unpublished data is considered non-existent data. We need to see the actual evidence, not just their conclusions.
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As a former military intelligence officer, did you find those weapons of mass destruction in Iraq? The nukes and bio-weapons the CIA reported Saddam had in his basement?
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