[set fair]

Do you have an explanation of how the polybasic furin cleavage site PRRA, came to be in SARS-Cov2?

Apparently the RmYN02 sequence has no basic amino acids.

https://www.wionews.com/opinions-blogs/was-the-mers-virus-a-model-for-the-creation-of-covid-19-335487

[Jolly2]

Do you have an explanation of how the polybasic furin cleavage site PRRA, came to be in SARS-Cov2?

Apparently the RmYN02 sequence has no basic amino acids.

https://www.wionews.com/opinions-blogs/was-the-mers-virus-a-model-for-the-creation-of-covid-19-335487

Thanks for the link

"There is now a preponderance of evidence that the COVID-19 virus was the product of laboratory experimentation rather than a natural infectious "jump" from bats to humans.

China still has a lot of explaining to do"

Still the Author is American,  and is missing that it could just have easily been an escape from Fort Detrick 4 months prior to Covid being found in Wuhan.

[puppypower]

Do you have an explanation of how the polybasic furin cleavage site PRRA, came to be in SARS-Cov2?

Apparently the RmYN02 sequence has no basic amino acids.

https://www.wionews.com/opinions-blogs/was-the-mers-virus-a-model-for-the-creation-of-covid-19-335487

This is a good article and analysis that suggests the virus was manufactured. I am curious why so many continue to carry the water for China?

I do not think this was designed to be a weapon. The majority of the victims are not soldier material due to advanced age and medical conditions not common to robust soldier types. If it was used for a weapon the soldiers would remain and he civilians would be toast. This is not good warfare.

It makes more sense that this was designed for social engineering. Killing the old and sickest, is only a few steps away abortion. Many have been conditioned to accept that.

I am getting a warning message that this web page is using significant energy and is slowing my MAC. There are not many active adds to cause this. Does anyone know what is causing this?  I shut off the warning. 

If I recall, very early in the pandemic, at least one scientist from China was disappeared. That got the energy light warning to kick back on. Maybe I should stop while I am ahead.

[Kryptid]

https://www.virology.ws/2020/05/14/sars-cov-2-furin-cleavage-site-revisited/

An interesting question is the origin of the furin cleavage site it SARS-CoV-2. Its closest relative, the bat isolate RaTG13, does not have this site. Nor do any of the other bat SARS-like CoVs or the pangolin CoVs that have been isolated. However recently a newly isolated bat SARS-like CoV, RmYN02, was shown to contain a poly basic amino acid insertion in the spike glycoprotein. This observation supports the hypothesis that the furin cleavage site in SARS-CoV-2 arose by recombination among bat viruses in nature.

[set fair]

https://www.virology.ws/2020/05/14/sars-cov-2-furin-cleavage-site-revisited/

An interesting question is the origin of the furin cleavage site it SARS-CoV-2. Its closest relative, the bat isolate RaTG13, does not have this site. Nor do any of the other bat SARS-like CoVs or the pangolin CoVs that have been isolated. However recently a newly isolated bat SARS-like CoV, RmYN02, was shown to contain a poly basic amino acid insertion in the spike glycoprotein. This observation supports the hypothesis that the furin cleavage site in SARS-CoV-2 arose by recombination among bat viruses in nature.

Thanks, I was trying to find this. I think "supports" is a bit strong. I don't think anyone knows enough to weigh such evidence. Virologiy has made great strides in just a century but there is a vast amount yet to be uncovered

[Kryptid]

Thanks, I was trying to find this. I think "supports" is a bit strong. I don't think anyone knows enough to weigh such evidence. Virologiy has made great strides in just a century but there is a vast amount yet to be uncovered

Perhaps so, but at least it shows a plausible natural mechanism.

Related to COVID's origin: https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00502-w

9 February — Nimble coronaviruses could leap straight from bats to humans

Some coronaviruses found in bats could jump directly to people without the need for further evolution in an intermediate animal host.

Victor Garcia at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and his colleagues implanted mice with human lung tissue and infected the tissue with various coronaviruses, including SARS-CoV-2 and two closely related coronaviruses isolated from bats. All of the viruses could efficiently multiply in the lung tissue (A. Wahl et al. Nature https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-021-03312-w; 2021). The findings suggest that coronaviruses circulating in bats could directly infect people, and have the potential to cause the next pandemic.

[evan_au]

smoking gun, for a lab created virus?

if you found someone's name encoded into the DNA, that would be a give-away

There are a very large number of ways you could encode (=decode) someone's name in DNA (or RNA, for SASR-COV2).
- A simple one might be 8-bit ASCII characters, with 4 RNA bases representing 1 character
- If someone's name has 10 letters, that would be a string of 40 RNA bases.
- There are something like 10 million ways you could map 4 RNA bases into an 8-bit ASCII character (and far more if you mapped 16 RNA bases into 2 ASCII characters)
- SARS-COV2, with around 30,000 RNA bases,  has around 30,000 possible alignments (x2, because you can read it in the opposite direction)

I reckon that if you took the SARS-COV2 genome, almost any translation from RNA bases to ASCII characters would yield a number of text strings that looked like human names (from some country in the world!).

It's just basic numerology!

[Colin2B]

I think "supports" is a bit strong.

Supports doesn’t mean proves. If there are a number of conflicting hypotheses then each will have its supporting evidence.

I don't think anyone knows enough to weigh such evidence.

Agreed, and this is particularly true as far as this forum goes because we are unlikely to see sufficient detail.

[Bored chemist]

Do you have an explanation of how the polybasic furin cleavage site PRRA, came to be in SARS-Cov2?

Apparently the RmYN02 sequence has no basic amino acids.

https://www.wionews.com/opinions-blogs/was-the-mers-virus-a-model-for-the-creation-of-covid-19-335487

In summary, retired US army colonel says "China is bad".
That article is typical of many . It says
"So, the question remains, if no yet identified close relative of COVID-19 has a similar furin polybasic cleavage site, from where did such a unique structural feature with amino acids in unusual positions arise?"
And then leaps off into a conspiracy theory rather than science.
The science would sat "well- so what? We haven't studied all the bat viruses".
It's probably in  a virus we haven't looked at yet.

It certainly isn't the "smoking gun" which the page presents it as being.

Whar's really disappointing is watching people on a science web page not spotting shoddy journalism.

[set fair]

I am sure that lots of entities, be they individuals, small groups, mega cults, .  .  .   have been inspired by the devastation of covid-19 that biological methods of attack can be very cheap, easy to make, devastating, and difficult to trace who did it.

The state of play now is: a killer virus would be of use to China but an own goal for the West or Russia to deploy. I'm not pointing the finger at China, just saying.

[puppypower]

Another option in terms of the Corona Virus, beyond warfare or social engineering, is to use it to help overthrow a government. In war, it is one side against another, with civilians part of the home team. With a coup, your target is more at the top of the food chain.There is limited engagement, while trying to leave the civilization population, in check, since you will need slaves later, if you can take over. A deadly virus can be used to induce fear and help pit the people against their leader. The propaganda machine of fake news played the blame game for each death. It is hard to find the running totals now. If that media policy did not change, I would not suspect this.

The Corona Virus did serve a changing of power purpose, intentionally or not, since it allowed last minute changes to formerly strict American election laws, that allowed a long shot candidate to win, who had ties to the country of the virus origin; China, There were winners in this strategy in terms of the final money and power counts.  A new team took over, with better ties to the country of the virus origin. Is this coincidence, act of God,or by design?

Anther thing that makes me think this way, is the policy in the USA, after you get any of the three effective Corona vaccines. You still need to hide behind a mask. This is not the policy after the flu shot. It is not the policy after AIDS vaccines or pills. The cure usually allows you to get back to normal, The corona solution requires you get back to the continued abnormal. This is suspect. It is like having hip or knee replacement surgery and then being told you will need to use crutches. What was the point of the surgery? It appears the coup still needs fear to perpetuate, since their hold on power is tentative. The changes being made do not reflect the majority view. My guess is that it will be harder to cheat in the next midterms elections, without fear in place, since this was and still is needed to justify a looser voting standard subject to irregularities with plausible denial.

This overlay smothering reaction to the vaccine, i.e., act like you did not get the vaccine, may also be due to projected fear that can arise due to paranoia. Those who run a coup will fear a coup since the word will get out; eye for an eye. This all may be a coincidence, and may simply be due to the Democrat party motto of never letting a good tragedy go to waste. Corona may have been a "devil send", in terms increasing government power and lowering individual rights. The Democrats do not want this to end. This was the dream for 100 years. The vaccine has to be sold as helpful, but not enough to suspend the fear and their control.

If you look at the results of the virus, the prime targets of the virus followed patterns. These patterns were seen as early as the first month; old age, race, obesity, respiratory problems, diabetes, etc. Yet the response by the bureaucratic policy makers was like these trends never existed, due to the one size fits all approach they took. This is also suspect, but is expected of bureaucrats, who think in terms of program growth and 10 year plans. I am glad Trump did not fully go this way when things were at the worse. His pushing the vaccine in record time much still be a thorn in the foot. Now that things are getting brighter, why still sell the doom and gloom?

To me the entire pandemic response loosely reminded me of a bureaucratic national response to an allergy to milk; lactose intolerance. There are certain people who are at risk, The symptoms for   some are minor; gas, and to others the affect can be fatal. Instead of focusing on the vulnerable; lactose intolerant, to protect them, we panic everyone when milk is delivered, as though allergies jump into and out of other time and space dimensions. We all must panic to the first sign of milk,  even if you are not allergic. If you fail to comply with the fear, you are a criminal. This tells me incompetence. Now even with the vaccine, the original one size is still supposed to fit all into their 10 year expansion plan

This could all be due to the state of the art of medicine and biology still being backwoods. It is still based on casino science; throw dice and pull levers on slot machines. The state of the art fails to include the impact of water to the degree it represents, so life can become more rational. The casino approach makes the virus appear more magical than it is. The witch doctors in government do not wish to anger the spirits of the virus. Their statistical oracles tell them that the herd must obey with fear, or else the wrath of the virus will be unleashed.

To summarize, a virus could be used to get this ball rolling, so a power structure can be changed. However, in the case of the corona virus there is a continued impact, that the new power mongers have to deal with. This can backfire on them if lingering affects last too long.  Virus may not be that useful in the future, since this pilot test was partially successful up front, but it has a lingering impact that may reverse the fortunes of the new leaders, leading to paranoia that shoots them in their own foot. This has to end on time, to be fully successful for coups.

[Bored chemist]

A new team took over, with better ties to the country of the virus origin.

In the real wold, Trump had close ties with China.
http://www.xinhuanet.com/english/special/trumpchina/index.htm
Biden didn't.

It is hard to find the running totals now.

In the real world, it is easy.
https://www.worldometers.info/coronavirus/

it allowed last minute changes to formerly strict American election laws, that allowed a long shot candidate to win,

In the real world, the "last minute changes" simply allowed people to vote; it didn't change who anyone voted for.

In the real world, Biden was not a "long shot" candidate; he was ahead in all the polls.
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/election-us-2020-53657174

His pushing the vaccine in record time

In the real world, he opposed the vaccine.
He supported nonsense like bleach and hydroxychloroquine instead.
So, since,as usual, Puppypower's views are at odds with the real world, it's probably not worth worrying about his ideas regarding covid.

I wonder why PP keeps posting obvious nonsense.

[Jolly2]

I am sure that lots of entities, be they individuals, small groups, mega cults, .  .  .   have been inspired by the devastation of covid-19 that biological methods of attack can be very cheap, easy to make, devastating, and difficult to trace who did it.

The state of play now is: a killer virus would be of use to China but an own goal for the West or Russia to deploy. I'm not pointing the finger at China, just saying.

Dont agree, all the houses that are going to be fore closed on, will return to the banks, all the business' that are not open are increasing the profits of companies like Amazon, the 1% in the west have massively increased their wealth thanks to covid19. There is also the Great reset brigade that are saying that the pandemic is an opportunity to change the way society works inorder to reduce pollution, over population and make a different system.

If the virus was released intentionally there is certianly evidence that the elites in the west have completely benefitted from it. Just saying.

[Bored chemist]

If the virus was released intentionally there is certianly evidence that the elites in the west have completely benefitted from it.

The elite would also have benefitted if covid had not happened.
That tells you a lot about the system, and nothing about covid.

[Colin2B]

If the virus was released intentionally there is certianly evidence that the elites in the west have completely benefitted from it. Just saying.

As @Bored chemist  says, many will have benefited, but also many have not or have lost out, for example the hospitality industry.

I’m sure that somewhere there is a group of white supremecist, pension-fund managers who are looking at the death stats and rubbing their hands with glee. However, any suggestion that they have been instrumental in developing or releasing the virus is total conjecture and unscientific. And adding ‘just saying’ on the end of such statements changes nothing.

This is a science site, not a conspiracy discussion site and we are taking a firmer line on limiting such speculation. Please take heed as there will be no second warnings. Just saying.