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Nearly 200 people under observation after Irkutsk lab worker dies from plague

212 points · 187 comments · ericmay

  1. robmusial · · focus · HN ↗
    I literally just finished Annie Jacobsen's book 'Biological War: A Scenario' last week where the central plot point is an accidental release of modified form of pneumonic plague from a lab in Siberia. Very coincidental timing, especially since it made me wonder how often labs like these have accidents and we never hear about them because it is cleaned up without issue.
    1. petcat · · focus · HN ↗
      > made me wonder how often labs like these have accidents and we never hear about them because it is cleaned up without issue.

      Did anyone ever confirm if the lab in Wuhan China was the originator of COVID? I remember that was a rumor but never heard if there was anything to it.

      1. lumost · · focus · HN ↗
        I recently heard a scientist use a phrase something along the lines of “when two extraordinarily improbably events occur together, there is probably a connection”.

        We’ll never know if the lab in Wuhan originated the virus. But it is awfully strange that the first patients of a novel pandemic coronavirus were workers at a lab conducting gain of function research on coronavirus.

        1. happymellon · · focus · HN ↗
          > I recently heard a scientist use a phrase something along the lines of “when two extraordinarily improbably events occur together, there is probably a connection”.

          Dumbest thing I've heard today.

          Ever since we started studying autism, we found it! Therefore studying causes autism.

          1. fragmede · · focus · HN ↗
            I might not have been the best student, but I wouldn't call studying "extraordinarily improbable".
            1. happymellon · · focus · HN ↗
              So it's not improbable research lab that was testing off runs from a wet market found the stuff they were searching for?
          2. 1718627440 · · focus · HN ↗
            > Dumbest thing I've heard today.

            Not really; "there is probably a connection" probably was supposed to mean "could be studied, maybe a correlation is found", rather than "surely there must be a causation", which is what some people seem to want to take it for.

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