You're thinking of the WIV database that was offlined 12 September.

This is new. We don't know why the sequence was deleted; the submitter cited "version control" reasons (data was being submitted somewhere else) but then deleted both known copies.

See an earlier post for reason. Looks like they resubmitted somewhere else and wanted the copy to ne deleted

Except the only other known copy was also deleted :/

"It turns out that mention of the sequencing project in question (PRJNA612766) also disappeared from China National GeneBank (CNGB) shortly after it was removed from the NIH Sequence Read Archive. (2/n)"

https://twitter.com/jbloom_lab/status/1407542296497688580?s=...

> among many other indicators of a lab leak:

literally nothing in this article or in the sequences is indication of a lab leak.

it isn't even particularly clear there is any cover up here, particularly since an article on the sequences was published.

if there's any deliberate suppression it would seem to be to hide the fact that scientists were studying the virus sooner than previously admitted and that they should have raised the alarm earlier.

Sadly he & his wife have repeatedly fostered confusion, the best example I have at hand are their comments[1] on Pres Biden's Executive Order 13991 - Protecting the Federal Workforce and Requiring Mask-Wearing[2]. When she said "the actual EO [...] doesn't actually specify that you're not required to wear a mask if you're away from people outside." which directly contradicts what was specified in the EO; "Such measures include wearing masks when around others". I find it difficult to take anything they say too seriously when they repeatedly make _mistakes_ like this.

> I have titled follow the science except when we want you to follow us and we're just going to pretend it's because we're talking science. One of the many executive orders that Biden has introduce President Biden on January 21st requires masks in national parks. [...] News reports on this tend to say masks required inside and outside when in crowded areas like overlooks, which you know, that that would sound reasonable. That sounds like, yes a hundred percent when you're indoors with strangers you should be wearing masks at this point Correct and you know in a really crowded place on overlooks ah okay sure but the actual EO [says...] [{reading of section 1 second paragraph only}] Thank you Zach. So that doesn't actually specify that you're not required to wear a mask if you're away from people outside. And that worries me because everyone who spends any time outside now and you all should be. Especially if you should be in whatever form...

[1] - https://youtu.be/wndotTtBTZQ?t=2799 [2] - https://www.whitehouse.gov/briefing-room/presidential-action...

Both Weinsteins constantly cry foul and have hot takes about literally everything so eventually maybe they will be right.

>He's been the canary in the coal mine on numerous issues surrounding COVID.

He's also been the carbon monoxide in the coal mine, steering people away from vaccines

Yeah, I don't agree with this assessment of the risks there.

The more people that are vaccinated, the shakier his argument becomes.

Covid19 has very real, well documented risks. The common vaccines have very low known risks by comparison. The space for unknown risks shrinks by the day.

That's the danger inherit with being a contrarian. Mostly you end up being wrong. It's a very important role though, to challenge accepted beliefs and create a dialog around them.

His main criticism is with

1. Not allowing dissenting opinions in the scientific community along with silencing any criticism from both media and big tech. If we are silencing dissenting view points, then are we really getting the truth?

2. Pushing it on pregnant women, kids and healthy youngsters where the risk vs reward isn't in favour.

3. Pushing it on people who have already recovered from COVID. There's no reason for this.

I was hoping that after what's happened in the last 1.5 year (and even past centuries), we would have learnt our lessons on how bad censorship is. But people don't learn their lessons. Bret correctly called it "intellectual authoritarianism".

Absolutely. It starts to get a little too deep down the rabbit hole for me saying that Ivermeticin being withheld is the "crime of the century" and that it isn't being used because it isn't patented and so there is no financial incentive to use it. It's a bold claim which I don't know how well is supported. But he deserves his uncensored say, especially since the whole lab-leak hypothesis debacle. Big Tech has acted shamefully in all of this. It is increasingly clear now.

I think 2 is debatable, and not vaccinating specific groups takes away from herd immunity, which hurts everyone. To be fair he discussed that criticism.

He's completely right about 1 and 3.

Everyone here hears about Weinstein literally every day. He and his brother may be the least silenced people in history. As well I have been twitter mobbed by Eric, making my account useless for quite a while. so he is perfectly happy to silence people who critique him I guess.

> least silenced people in history

His YouTube channel's already got strikes and videos taken down and demonetized. He's moving his podcast over to Odysee because of this. His ArticlesOfUnity twitter account (unrelated to COVID) was banned too.

Are they applying rules especially to him? Or are they not making exceptions for him?

I don't see a problem with the latter. It is almost always the latter.

> It is almost always the latter.

That tells me nothing will change your mind as it indicates that you still think social media censorship is anywhere remotely fair.

Not all vaccines are created equal.

Great point - The COVID19 Vaccines, particularly the mRNA ones are some of the best ever made, ~90% effective at preventing disease and ~100% effective at preventing death.

I'm starting to suspect this isn't because the vaccines are inherently particularly good, though. They're incredibly effective against one particular strain of Covid-19, and for a while that was pretty much the only thing in circulation, but as soon as more came along their effectiveness against those started to drop. Viruses less novel than Covid-19 presumably have a lot more genetic diversity, so being incredibly effective at one specific variant with one specific genome would achieve a lot less.

Honestly, I'm seriously starting to doubt whether it's even remotely feasible to achieve herd immunity with the current vaccines - the Delta variant is looking really worrying on that front.

This is factually incorrect. Of the four known COVID strains in broad circulation, the Moderna and Pfizer vaccines have displayed efficacy against all of them.

The Delta variant is more contagious, but has not demonstrated vaccine escape behavior against Pfizer and Moderna [1], and although efficacy was shown to be reduced by mutations in trials, both vaccines still successfully result in complete neutralization in of the virus by antibodies in test titres (in brief: you vaccinate people, then draw their blood and expose the antibodies to virus in vitro and see whether neutralization is effective - it was).

[1] https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/jun/15/the-covid-delt...

This is a pretty ignorant response. There are many ways to judge a vaccine than its effectiveness. There are also side effects. And its pretty standard for people to get the "Pfizer-flu". That's a pretty major downside to a vaccine. And as well, we don't know the long-term health impacts. There may be heart issues related to taking the vaccine. We have to wait until the data comes in.

> That's a pretty major downside to a vaccine

The Shingrix vaccine is recommended for everyone over 50. It's a two-dose regimen to prevent shingles. If you've ever known anyone who has shingles, you'll rush to get those shots as soon as your doctor recommends it.

Guess what? The side effects can be rough. I know from personal experience: the second dose knocked me down for at least 24 hours. I felt awful and pretty much did nothing but sleep. By the evening of the next day, I was fine.

I also got my Pfizer vaccine shots around the same time, and had nothing worse than a sore arm. Even if someone had told me there was a 100% chance I'd have the same side effects from the COVID-19 vax as I did from Shingrix, I still wouldn't have hesitated. A day or two of feeling terrible versus the known dangers of COVID-19 is an easy choice.

Don't overplay the "major downside" bit.

Which COVID-19 vaccine did you get, and what side effects did you have, if any?

yep... plus issues with astrazeneca, where chances of clotting issues and death might be higher than covid deaths for specific groups (young women mostly). Killing two teenage girls to save a 100 grandmas is a hard math to do.

Do you have a source for those numbers?

I use Google, but there are alternatives. OP is obviously using very round numbers, but given that is not wrong.

Those numbers are wildly optimistic. I would like to see which studies you are quoting so I can review them.

For the Pfizer mRNA vaccine here are the results from studies in Israel.

https://pharmaceutical-journal.com/article/feature/everythin...

It gives a lot of data on chances of symptoms and illness at various periods after the first and second doses from various studies, however the bottom line is that long term the national level studies show that:

“The vaccine also provided 97.2% protection against hospitalisation overall and 97.5% protection against severe and critical hospitalisation.”

These are outstanding results, among the best of any vaccine ever developed, and from studies of large a large and diverse population.

It was 100% effective is a study of 2,000 12-15 year olds. This is important because in countries like Brazil where the death rate is incredibly high, even the small fraction of victims that are children adds up to many hundreds, or even thousands of deaths.

Maybe that’s why he is attacked by the mass media and big tech:

https://taibbi.substack.com/p/meet-the-censored-bret-weinste...