These days anytime any politician makes any claims about Covid-19, you’ve got to wonder whether it’s more about politics than real science. After all, throughout the pandemic, politics has infiltrated Covid-19 decision-making like botox in a reality TV star. So when the office of Senator Richard Burr (R-N.C.) dropped “An Analysis of the Origins of the COVID-19 Pandemic Interim Report,” just two weeks before the midterm election, you’ve gotta wonder whether this report was more about politics than actually determining what really happened.
After all, in the report, Burr did indicate that last Summer he and Senator Patty Murray (D-Washington) “announced a bipartisan Health, Education, Labor and Pensions (HELP) Committee oversight effort into the origins of SARS-CoV-2, the virus that caused the COVID-19 pandemic as part of our effort to address pandemic preparedness and response programs.” Dictionary.com defines bipartisan as “representing, characterized by, or including members from two parties or factions,” and not “screw it, why don’t I just issue a report myself?” It’s also interesting why such a interim report would be issued so quickly now before it’s been properly vetted by the scientific community. Why the rush? And why wasn’t there more of a heads up to everyone that this would be on its way? Was this designed to be a Halloween scare? Or maybe just maybe the midterm elections had something to do with it?
Plus, this interim report drew some pretty strong conclusions that usually would require a lot more supporting scientific evidence than the report actually provided. What’s a strong conclusion? How about, “Based on the analysis of the publicly available information, it appears reasonable to conclude that the Covid-19 pandemic was, more likely than not, the result of a research-related incident.” Yeah, that statement certainly has drawn headlines and attention on social media. The phrase “more likely than not” sounds fairly definitive. For example, if you were to tell your significant other that “based on analysis of publicly available information, it appears reasonable to conclude that you are more likely than not a cheater,” you had better more likely than not provide enough specific concrete evidence to justify such a claim. Otherwise all of your possessions including your butt would more likely than not end up on the street. Similarly, this report seemed to be claiming that the evidence is already strong enough to conclude that a lab leak started the Covid-19 pandemic. But what evidence did the report then provide? Well, here’s a hint. It rhymes with “Not a troll bot.” Yes, not a whole lot.
Did any real scientists develop, vet, and support the findings of this Interim Report?
Let’s take a look at what some real scientists who have real expertise in this area said on Twitter about this report. Spoiler alert: some expletives more likely than not emerged. For example, Kristian G. Andersen, PhD, a Professor of Immunology and Microbiology at Scripps Research, used the phrase “Flood the zone with bull [bleep]” when referring to what’s going on with this report:
And Peter Hotez, MD, PhD, Dean of the National School of Tropical Medicine, wrote, “My view: a total load of antiscience [bleep],” in the following tweet:
To adapt the words from that song in the movie Bring It On, Burr, it’s cold in here— with here being real scientists’ reaction to the report. Bull-bleep and antiscience bleep weren’t exactly words of endorsement. Hotez also provided some real scientific papers describing how the severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2…
Read More: Is New Senate GOP Covid-19 Pandemic Origin Report More About Politics Than Science?