Treacherous ancestry - by Philipp Markolin, PhD
Why are US scientists dragged in front of Congress in Benghazi-style show trials? How come highly rated research programs get quietly shut down? Is it justified to treat virologists with suspicion, consider them guilty of recklessness or dishonesty, even leak their subpoenaed private conversations to professional smear artists for cherry-picking?
The origin controversy is political and polarized. Myths that COVID-19 was somehow a manmade pandemic are still impactful, whether they are true or not. Polls have shown that 2 out of 3 US citizens believe that SARS-CoV-2, the virus that started the COVID-19 pandemic, came out of a laboratory rather than nature.
Scientists worldwide vehemently disagree. The emerging scientific consensus among domain experts is that SARS-CoV-2 is a natural virus that entered humanity via zoonotic spillover ( more importantly, there is a consensus stemming from the body of evidence that is entirely unequivoca l).
Yet fewer and fewer citizens seem to hear or care for their evidence-based voices. Domain experts are distrusted, but how much of that is self-inflicted, and how much is sown by anti-science actors?
