Starting July 1, Academic Publishers Can't Paywall NIH-Funded Research

Re:Starting July 1, Academic Publishers Can't Paywall NIH-Fu... by trhway on Thursday May 01, 2025 @09:53PM (#43865374)

You again failed to provide definition. And you seem to get confused about goalposts. So, let me reiterate 3 hard facts here:

1. as my previous link is gone here is 2 pretty same NIH and government definitions of GoF, 2016 and 2025:

https://www.congress.gov/bill/119th-congress/senate-bill/738...

            (1) Gain-of-function research.--The term ``gain-of-function 
        research'' means any research that--
                    (A) involves the genetic alteration of an organism 
                to change or enhance the organism's biological 
                functions, which change or enhancement may include 
                increased infectivity, transmissibility, pathogenicity, 
                or host range (which is the spectrum of hosts that an 
                organism can infect); or
                    (B) may be reasonably anticipated to confer 
                attributes to an organism, such that the organism would 
                have enhanced infectivity, pathogenicity, or 
                transmissibility, or otherwise pose a threat to 
                national security, public safety, or the health of 
                humans, companion animals, or livestock, poultry, 
                seafood and aquaculture species, or game animals.

https://osp.od.nih.gov/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/Gain-of-Fu...

"Gain-of-function (GOF) research involves experimentation that aims or is expected to (and/or, perhaps, actually does) increase the transmissibility and/or virulence of pathogens."

Both definitions clearly cover Wuhan research - genetically implanting ACE2 binding protein on non-human coronavirus so that the resulting virus infects and kill human cells containing ACE2 receptor. Thus hard fact numero uno - Fauci lied to Congress.

>Your claim was that Proximal Origins authors didn't consider the lab leak.

No. My claim is that NIH didn't perform any scientific study - which would naturally include peer reviewed publishing of results - of Wuhan created viruses vs. COVID.

What doesn't count as such a study is the lazy email chat between several dudes who were recruited by Daszak without even letting them know of the conflict of interests that he and Fauci had on the matter.

3. Fauci as a top leader at a scientific institution had the duty to maintain scientific integrity of the institution. Giving his and Daszak conflict of interests on the matter, he catastrophically failed at maintaining that scientific integrity when he didn't not send independent investigators to Wuhan instead of Daszak.

Note how synergistically the fact 3. dovetails with the fact 1. and how that provides very plausible explanation for the fact 2.

And with that i rest my case :)

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Starting July 1, Academic Publishers Can't Paywall NIH-Fu... by sorcerer-mar on Thursday May 01, 2025 @10:23PM (#43865543)

Ah yes, now linking to the GoF definition that 1) doesn't govern NIH's decisions and 2) includes E. coli for insulin manufacturing.

Great stuff.

And just totally bailing on your claim that "Daszak ran into WIV and destroyed evidence" lol

Have a good night!

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Starting July 1, Academic Publishers Can't Paywall NIH-Fu... by randm_sequence on Friday May 02, 2025 @07:25AM (#43868365)

I worked with researchers in this space - virology + combatting future pandemics - in the decade before the pandemic. The one fact that the last 5 years never readily disclosed is that the core ideology of this community of researchers was fundamentally divided. About half of the researchers, including many leading virologists whose names appeared in the news, believed and argued passionately for the lab-based creation of super-viruses and super-bacteria. They believed that the only way to save humanity from a catastrophic pandemic was to engineer absolute nightmare bugs in the lab so that they could develop cures and vaccines. The other half of us, myself included, thought that this was pure hubris and infinitely too dangerous because humans and labs are fallible and leaks happen with surprisingly regularity. The moment that this pandemic become broad public knowledge, the portion of the community that advocated for creating these super-viruses became shockingly quiet and everyone just started to cover-their-asses and their funding.

In about 5 years it will become common knowledge that longCOVID is simply the persistance of the SARS-CoV2 virus within the human body and that there are both symptomatic versions of this disease (aka "longhaulers") and asymptomatic versions of this disease (aka, many of the so called "fully recovered"). Note that we have zero direct evidence that the virus ever leaves the body; it is just assumed because nasal swabs test negative and, for some, symptoms go away. It is a good time to invest in pharmaceutical companies that have already developed antivirals.

[ Parent | on HN ]

Re:Starting July 1, Academic Publishers Can't Paywall NIH-Fu... by sorcerer-mar on Friday May 02, 2025 @08:21AM (#43868792)

This is partially why I think the whole "they're conspiratorially lying to us and it was for sure a lab leak!" is a huge distraction. First, we have literally hundreds of pages of emails of scientists saying they believed (correctly or incorrectly) it was not a leak. Second, there is approximately zero chance we will ever know that it came from a lab. Third, it doesn't actually give us any more information: it could have come from any one of countless labs doing work on viruses like this.

Dangerous GoF research should be outright banned regardless!

Insofar as there is huge ambiguity in what we did or didn't know at the time, I can fault scientists for covering their own asses and their preferred research directions (which I agree are dangerous), but I can't fault them for biasing themselves against statements that leaned on the side of ambiguous that might have, at the time, literally sparked a war.

[ Parent | on HN ]