Re:Evidence SARS-CoV-2 Emerged from a Biological Laboratory ...
by DoingIsLearning on Friday April 17, 2020 @08:08AM
(#22898285)
> whether it escaped from the lab is a bit of a whatever
It's actually a big difference:
It's the scenario of accepting a statiscal misfortune from mother nature versus the scenario of a lack of duty-of-care from a public institution, closely followed by having to pay reparations to a very long list of countries.
Re:Evidence SARS-CoV-2 Emerged from a Biological Laboratory ...
by dwd on Saturday April 18, 2020 @04:44AM
(#22906261)
Duty-of-care is usually interpreted as what would a reasonable person expect them to do in that situation. As long as they took all reasonable precautions and followed the safety protocols required for handling a pathogen of that type, then there shouldn't be any liability.
My point is that they failed in their disclosure whether it came from the lab or not, and more likely where foreign governments would pursue them for any repatriations.
It's the same situation if there was a nuclear accident - once it has occurred the expectation is to be upfront with the facts so other nations can prepare and deal with any damage. The circumstances of why are only important as far as preventing it happening again.
No one is really saying it was intentional; and while risky, the research into coronavirii that could trigger a future pandemic was valuable. But it was a screw-up; someone made a mistake or took a shortcut and here we are.
China is going to be under pressure regardless to either open up that research facility, or shut it down so it doesn't happen again there, or anywhere else in the world.