> The lab-leak conspiracy gang has smeared scientists and misled the public into believing a theory that has no factual support whatsoever. They should be ashamed.<p>Cleverly disguised opinion article. The USG debunked nothing. The official stance of the US has been the pangolin-soup theory since 2020. The USG still has to contend with a large contingent of actual scientists who have evidence otherwise.<p>I guess I didn't expect any different from the LA times. Objectively speaking the US government has a vested interest in keeping China-US relations slightly less than lukewarm for the time being. They hardly can be considered an impartial arbiter of truth and after the latest ruling against Biden pressuring social media companies you can be certain "truth" is very flexible in the white house.
It hardly debunks it. Scroll to the bottom of page four in the original report.<p>I treat this whole thing just like every other government message; could be this, could be that, could be a combination of both. If anyone takes any message from any government agency from any country as gospel truth they are delusional.
The thing that tickles my conspiracy theorist, is that the outbreak originated 2 km from the lab that gain-of-function research into SARS-2 strains was outsourced to.
I would expect Covid is one of several lab made viruses released by accident. It’s not malicious just a statistical inevitability as the means become more accessible.<p>Personally I’m very concerned about the grey goo scenario. The three disasters I’m mentally prepared for today are a heart attack, hydrogen bomb flash and having everyone and everything around me rapidly dissolve into a giant block of carbon.