Robbie Tulip Blog

In their new article, Might SARS?CoV?2 Have Arisen via Serial Passage through an Animal Host or Cell Culture?, published with free access in August, K&D Sirotkin explore the suggestion that the COVID 19 virus was accidentally released from a laboratory in Wuhan. The journal is BioEssays, published by Wiley online. The comments below are fully referenced in the article.

The article suggests the novel coronavirus could have come from dual?use gain?of?function research, as the process of viral serial passage mimics a natural zoonotic jump, and offers explanations for SARS?CoV?2’s distinctive features, raising ethical questions about the risks of this area of research.

Noting that this virus acts like no microbe humanity has ever seen, the authors contend that the natural origin hypothesis fails to account for its unique genomic characteristics, and ignores the long history of serial passage as a method to manipulate viral genomes by forcing zoonosis between species, with the same signature but shorter time frame compared to natural viral mutation.

The dual?use gain?of?function research tool of serial passage was first applied to an influenza virus in 1977. Then in 1979, a Soviet lab leaked weaponized anthrax through an improperly maintained exhaust filter, but Soviet authorities blamed the deaths on contaminated local meat. This cover-up, with the same reason provided as in Wuhan, withstood inquiries until 1992, when analysis of genetic distance proved the weapons lab was to blame.

In 2011, serial passage between ferrets created viruses that were transmissible by aerosol. One highly virulent strain was said to

The Case Against Sugar by Gary Taubes
https://www.amazon.com/Case-Against-Sugar-Gary-Taubes/dp/0307701646

Here is my review, posted at Amazon. (link)

This book tells the tale of the scientific paradigm shift from blaming fat to blaming sugar as the main cause of disease. The noncommunicable lifestyle illnesses of modern sedentary society include diabetes, cancer, heart attack, hypertension, tooth decay, obesity, gout and senility. Sugar is the main culprit for the epidemic explosion of these conditions in recent years. The science behind this discovery, and the social failure to see and address it, is laid out by Gary Taubes in forensic detail. It is a story of grand corruption and stupidity, both moral and political. The sugar industry, hand in glove with its close partner the tobacco industry, has systematically deceived and suborned public health in its pursuit of filthy lucre, at massive avoidable cost in health expenditure and quality of life.

Starting with the key role of sugar in slavery, Taubes explains how the depravity continued with the key role of sugar in making cigarettes so pleasant and addictive by enabling easy inhalation of their smoke. Gross conflict of interest was then allowed by government, allowing so-called scientists paid by the sugar industry to systematically deny and conceal the ghastly and obvious criminal role of sugar in driving avoidable suffering. Like drug pushers, the sugar industry has tried to hook its addicts when young, for example with the lying portrayal of breakfast cereals as health foods, while concealing the scale and effect and coordination of its assault on our health.

The toxic cocktail of Coca-Cola and cigarettes given to American servicemen in World War Two was one example of Big Sugar