Quote:
Originally Posted by Firebot
Imagine if this pandemic occured with an accidental release of a gain-of-function version of ebola which was next on the research list?
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Exactly. How terrifying is this. Look at all the damage wrought by some obscure coronavirus they pulled from bats. While deadly and dangerous to a decent chunk of the population, most cases are like mine where if I hadn't lost smell for a few days I would have never thought I was sick. You won't be getting that with gain of function Ebola, you won't have statistically no danger to children with gain of function Ebola. That's why it's so critical to get as close to a conclusive answer on this as possible, because this is a world wide problem that needs to be addressed ASAP. There was already great hesitation and ethical concerns about this research before, and now we can see that this is no longer a theoretical drawback, it's a real concern and the world is exceedingly likely that this was overall a pretty mild pathogen. This is now the biggest story of the 21st century so far and we can't afford to sweep it under the rug for any reason.