Talk:COVID-19 lab leak theory/Archive 1

I've only read the lead so far and since the last sentence contradicted the mainstream zoonotic view, suggesting that only some scientists consider the lab leak scenario less likely, I checked the cited source. It doesn't support the sentence, in fact it reminds readers of The Lancet's conclusion that "the evidence to date supports the view that Sars-Cov-2 is a naturally occurring virus rather than the result of laboratory creation and release" and that the idea was mostly pushed by conspiracy theorists, although it of course remains part of scientific investigations.^[1] —PaleoNeonate – 02:26, 13 January 2021 (UTC)

You are right and that sentence in the lede is something I need to work on in order to ready this draft for review. I thought that the Telegraph source was worth including as it is the only known public statement by Peter Daszak, who is on record as saying that the "the idea that this virus escaped from a lab is just pure baloney", and remains one the most vocal critics of the theory. In an interview with the BBC, Daszak was asked if would seek access to the Wuhan lab to rule the lab-leak theory out, and he answered that it was "not his job" to do that. Ever since Ralph Baric got FOIA'ed, there has been some controversy around the Lancet letter, as it was revealed that Daszak is its author, and it doesn't represent a majority position of scientists. Both Ralph Barric and Linfa Wang, two of Peter Daszak and Shi Zhengli's closest research partners have removed their signatures from the letter. Zhengli's research was focused more on rodent viruses and didn't even get into bats before she partnered with Daszak and Baric (with NIH funds), and her Wikipedia biography hardly notes her main body of work prior to 2013.

Other than that sentence in the lead, I think we should also create a new section on opposing views, but that's where it gets complicated as most of the opposing scientists focus on disproving the theory that SARS-COV-19 is a synthetic or chimeric virus that was created in a laboratory as a bioweapon, which is not what we are claiming here, and has (hopefully) been made clear in the lede. What makes this complicated is that other scientists have also said that it cannot be ruled out that SARS-COV-2 isn't anthropogenic in some way, and Ralph Baric, who is undoubtedly one of the world’s leading experts in the construction of synthetic viruses (who has said he doesn't think the lab leak scenario is likely, but possible), is on record in an interview with RIA as saying that when using assembly methods recently developed, one could "build a virus that is completely indistinguishable from a natural one".

The methods that Baric was referring to in that interview are known as "seamless cloning", such as Gibson assembly, Golden Gate Cloning, and I don't think it's in the scope of this article to go into whether the virus may or not may not have been engineered, and with these methods, as even if they were, it isn't nefarious in any way, as risky as they may be, scientists create chimeric viruses all the time, and not as bioweapons for governments, but to further their own research objectives for public health.

ScrupulousScribe (talk) 02:00, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

Peter Daszak’s propaganda doesn’t qualify as reliable, especially in the publication that shamefully published since-retracted SurgiSphere papers that were also used to push a narrative that has been discredited, especially when there’s a massive patent-pharma conflict of interest financially behind them.

What it is good for is disqualifying its own strawman. --50.201.195.170 (talk) 14:03, 16 January 2021 (UTC)

PaleoNeonate, I was just wondering why you tagged the Washington Post as an unreliable source? That particular article was published by the Washington Post's own editorial board as part of the The Post's View section, not a guest blogger post. The Post published another article on the topic more recently, which I would like to include too. ScrupulousScribe (talk) 02:22, 14 January 2021 (UTC)

Then it could be attributed to its author(s) as an op-ed, but cannot be used to make fact statements in Wikipedia's voice. —PaleoNeonate – 12:00, 15 January 2021 (UTC)

🛑 And you tell me, don’t don’t use bullshit tags, hypocrite (sort of)! Again dude,

Wikipedia is not censored. Images or details contained within this article may be graphic or otherwise objectionable to some readers, to ensure a quality article and complete coverage of its subject matter. For more information, please refer to Wikipedia's content disclaimer regarding potentially objectionable content and options for not seeing an image.

.

You coming to my talk page to tell me I can’t use it is harassment. You should know better than to make strawman arguments--50.201.195.170 (talk) 13:49, 16 January 2021 (UTC)

If that is addressed to me and is related to this, I gently explained why it was out of context. Your accusation is also inappropriate. You'd have a hard time convincing administrators that my single friendly post at your talk page is harassment, but WP:ANI is there. —PaleoNeonate – 20:30, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

Considering the other article Investigations into the origin of COVID-19 that currently enjoys more scrutiny for being in mainspace, this draft becomes a WP:POVFORK of both that article as well as of Misinformation related to the COVID-19 pandemic... —PaleoNeonate – 19:26, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

If we are to have an article on Investigations into the origin of COVID-19, then this would be an WP:UNDUE offshoot of it at best; even if its content were fine and its sourcing were up to spec, it'd be an obvious candidate for merging. XOR'easter (talk) 20:56, 20 January 2021 (UTC)

I agree that the contents of this article could be incorporated into the Investigations into the origin of COVID-19 article by editors such as Forich, Normchou and Arcturus, or any others with an interest in the topic. It would have been hard to get this draft approved, as the discussions around WP:SYNTH and WP:NOTSYNTH would have been quite contentious, as with this topic on other pages.

Boing!_said_Zebedee, please can you delete this draft, if other editors also agree? Thanks.

ScrupulousScribe (talk) 10:39, 22 January 2021 (UTC)

Disagreeeeeeee. Want to be able to access the source[s], and contribution history. I'll copy it to my userspace for now, as I don't expect my request to be accepted, but if it is, I'll speedy my copy.--50.201.195.170 (talk) 09:30, 23 January 2021 (UTC)

The article can be left to expire (WP:G13) or could be nominated at WP:MFD, another option would be redirecting it to a mainspace article. —PaleoNeonate – 17:34, 25 January 2021 (UTC)

Paleo: this article should redirect to "COVID-19 misinformation." At best, an article could be created called "COVID-19 lab leak conspiracy theory." -Darouet (talk) 14:55, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

@Darouet: his is a bit confusing as I technically never posted here (thanks for the ping), this was a copy and there was no history merge. I noticed the redirect and don't contest it, —PaleoNeonate – 03:39, 11 February 2021 (UTC)

This article has WP:FALSEBALANCE and WP:PROFRINGE problems. Especially since a WHO official released a statement today debunking this.

This article also has WP:PROSELINE problems.

The title may also be problematic. I don't know if it's correct to call a fringe theory a "hypothesis".

There's also the question of whether a fringe idea deserves its own article. Perhaps the section in COVID-19 misinformation is sufficient to cover this idea.

The bottom line is that mainstream scientists have not given this idea any credence, but the lay press has become obsessed with it, similar to how they are obsessed with ivermectin. We really need to ask ourselves if these fringe ideas deserve more than a small section in their respective parent articles. –Novem Linguae (talk) 07:18, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

I added material in the lead about the WHO statement. Arcturus (talk) 11:47, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

Who determines which scientists are to be considered mainstream? Richard Elbright, David Relman, Philip Murphy and Marc Lipsitch maintain an h-index of 70+. Rather than fringe scientists, they represent some of the most productive and impactful scientists within biology (objectively-speaking). Moreover, their respective domains are clearly relevant in regards to the question at hand. Scientific inquiry is based on falsification and not credence, but if that is the approach you wish to adopt it should be made clear at which point alternative hypotheses may be considered. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 95.144.251.103 (talk) 12:54, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

Hi WhatamIdoing, since you are the original author of Wikipedia:Biomedical information it would be good to get your feedback on how you think MEDRS applies for sourcing the topic of Covid-19 origins. From what I recall of the discussion at the WP:RSN Noticeboard , you seemed to agree with ScrupulousScribe that MEDRS may not apply here at the moment. Other editors agreeing with that position include Guest2625, Normchou, Atsme, JPxG, Geogene, My very best wishes, Park3r, Adoring nanny and Forich. I've pinged them here in case they would like to offer an opinion again. Given that there is likely to be speculation around the lab leak hypothesis until we have some evidence for another scenario, it would perhaps be a good idea to determine how best to apply WP:PAG to this topic. Thanks, Arcturus (talk) 20:18, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

Hi. Covid origin refers to many things. For example, it covers reservoir host, intermediate host, index case, animal source, early spread, zoonotic event, and genomic investigations into the common ancestor of SARS-CoV-2. Each of these origin aspects requires diffent types of expertise, ranging from bioinformatics, structural biology, molecular biology, immunology, virology, veterinary, and epidemiology. The two areas most closely related to the lab leak theory are: i) the alleged undisclosed existence of a bat swab in WIV with an at least 99.7% similarity to SARS-CoV-2 that served as backbone to SARS-CoV-2, and ii) the retrospective sampling of animals and wildlife traders in and around Wuhan to test for antibodies as evidence of an alleged long period of circulation (pre-December 2019) of SARS-CoV-2.

Sources for point i) include declarations from WIV personnel, and independent investigations into the WIV research logs. Sources for point ii) include chinese epidemiologists and veterinaries. Declarations from WIV personnel seem fishy to me (i.e. "all our research is published in journals", databases disappearing, RATG13 having a late nomenclature, Chinese governement censoring scientific papers) and regarding point ii) it appears that all chinese epidemiologists and veterinaries went on sabbatical since 2020.

I vote for using top RS (e.g. Reuters, AP, BBC, New York Times) to document these suspicions and lack of investigations, but giving them little weight in the SARS-CoV-2 or related articles. Forich (talk) 21:08, 8 February 2021 (UTC)

I've created a second redirect, COVID-19 lab leak conspiracy theory, also going to COVID-19 misinformation#Wuhan lab leak story. -Darouet (talk) 14:58, 10 February 2021 (UTC)

The hypothesis that the COVID19 outbreak may have originated from a lab leak is not a conspiracy theory for the following reasons:

1: Lab leaks are not uncommon events, and there is precedence for leaks having lead to outbreaks. A historical review of outbreaks of potentially pandemic pathogens by the Scientist’s Working Group on Chemical and Biologic Weapons at the Center for Arms Control and Nonproliferation, lists at least five laboratory leaks from nationally funded laboratories since 1966 that caused real-world outbreaks.

2: The Wuhan Lab was studying similar viruses in 2018 from samples collected from bats in southern China.

3: At said lab, they studied a version of SARS-COVID that was transmissible from bats to humans. .

4: This research was funded by the National Institute of Health.

5: Because a leak would have been accidental, a lab leak does not classify as a conspiracy theory.

6: The lab leak has not been disqualified as a possible source of the outbreak.

Proposed Edits Include the removal of some inflammatory language, correction of some sources cited in misleading ways, and additional links to primary sources. Original citation numbers were otherwise left unchanged.

---Start Proposed Edit---

Wuhan Lab Leak Hypothesis

One Hypothesis is that the outbreak originated by a leak from the Wuhan Institute of Virology. The Wuhan Institute had been conducting research on viruses collected from bats in southern China. Funded in part by grants from the National Institute of Health, in 2018, this research included a version of SARS-CoV-2 that was transmissible to humans. At the lab, SARS-CoV-2 was also engineered for gain-of-function studies to understand cross-species transmission risk where in vivo experiments demonstrated replication of a chimeric virus in mouse lung with notable pathogenesis.

While there have been at least 5 pathogenic outbreaks caused by lab leaks since 1966, there is no conclusive evidence yet linking the COVID19 outbreak to a lab leak. On February 9, 2021 a team probing the origins of the COVID-19 pandemic for the World Health Organization rated the lab leak theory as "extremely unlikely",[44][45][46] with the WHO mission chief saying in a subsequent interview that the hypothesis is "not impossible" and "still being discussed openly and accepted."[47]

Engineered Bio Weapon Theory

Conspiracy theories and unfounded speculation have gained popularity during the pandemic. One such narrative says the virus was engineered as a bio-weapon.[28][27][25][29] Believers are dedicated to trying to unearth "evidence" which supports the position, while attacking science which does not fit their beliefs, suggesting an ideological basis to their activities.[27]

One early source of the bio-weapon narrative was former Israeli secret service officer Dany Shoham, who gave an interview to The Washington Times about the Wuhan laboratory.[31][32] A commentary in The Epoch Times posed the question, "is the novel coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan an accident occasioned by weaponizing the virus at that [Wuhan P4 virology] lab?"[33][34] One scientist from Hong Kong, Li-Meng Yan, fled China and released a preprint stating the virus was modified in a lab rather than having a natural evolution. Peer-reviewers determined the paper "did not demonstrate sufficient scientific evidence to support its claims."[35]

US politicians began spreading the conspiracy theories, including GOP Senators Tom Cotton, Josh Hawley and Marsha Blackburn especially President Donald Trump and Secretary of State Mike Pompeo.[36][37][38][39] Many scientists and authorities debunked the theories, including NIAID director Anthony Fauci and the Five Eyes intelligence alliance.[40][41][42]

---End Proposed Edit--- — Preceding unsigned comment added by 204.11.84.173 (talk) 07:32, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

 Not done The two stories are discussed in reliable sources as conspiracy theories and/or unfounded speculation. Wikipedia follows sources. Alexbrn (talk) 07:35, 21 February 2021 (UTC)

Just as an explanation: it is a conspiracy theory because after the supposed leak, there had to be a conspiracy to hide it. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:23, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

If you don't think this incredibly notable subject exist on wiki. Peregrine Fisher (talk) 07:29, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

See Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:COVID-19 lab leak hypothesis. Alexbrn (talk) 07:50, 27 February 2021 (UTC)

I just saw an article in The Bulletin of Atomic Scientists on the COVID lab leak hypothesis. This follows on scientists calling for investigation of the lab leak and analysis in a WHO report. Clearly, this is not a FRINGE theory the way that "caused by a meteor" or "caused by the Jews" is a Fringe theory. And the topic of a lab leak is clearly notable enough for stand-alone coverage, whether or not it happened. I intend to restore this as a stand-alone article in the near future; however I certainly will not restore the February revisions, as much of the 52KB of content there is problematic. User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 02:01, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

Agree we should show people that this kind of junk is out there and that it has zero merit.Moxy- 02:37, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

After discussion with one other editor, I have decided to expand Investigations into the origin of COVID-19 first, before splitting content to this page. User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 02:40, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

My BOLD re-target was reverted; I will start a WP:RFD discussion in about 12 hours if I'm happy with the new target at that time. User:力 (power~enwiki, π, ν) 15:02, 6 May 2021 (UTC)

I agree the redirect should go to the Investigations into the origin of COVID-19#Investigations. At that location the topic is discussed. On the different talk pages, this is the consensus of the editors. See the discussion at Wikipedia_talk:Biomedical_information#RFC: Disease / pandemic origins. --Guest2625 (talk) 07:47, 31 May 2021 (UTC)

The proper venue to get a consensus for a redirect is to take it to WP:RFD. RandomCanadian (talk / contribs) 13:54, 31 May 2021 (UTC)

This is an area I'm not at all familiar with, but I'd recommend not deviating from the official line too much here. This is a fascinating theory and one that may very well in the future be vindicated, but for now it remains in the realm of pseudoscience. Sorry I can't help further, and keep up the good work. Daedalus 96 (talk) 19:21, 18 January 2021 (UTC)

it's not a theory, it's a hypothesis, hence the name. Hypotheses are the stuff of science, and your confusion about this shows you are not qualified to make a judgement about what is pseudoscience. 2603:8001:9500:9E98:0:0:0:9A7 (talk) 07:35, 22 February 2021 (UTC)

In this instance, the distinction between the two is pedantic at best. What is an hypothesis but a theory that "might in the future be vindicated"? Please learn some manners before responding to me in future. You will not win any supporters for your cause by being puerile or obnoxious, especially to those who are broadly in sympathy with it to begin with. Daedalus 96 (talk) 21:16, 28 February 2021 (UTC)

Actually, a hypothesis is just a single assumption while a theory is a system of assumptions and conclusions. Theories are the stuff of science, while hypotheses can be all over the map. So, you are right in principle, though not in wording, and the IP drew wrong conclusions. --Hob Gadling (talk) 09:39, 5 March 2021 (UTC)

Per my comments above and the discussion there, I've copied text and sources (but have not transcluded) from Severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2#Reservoir and origin to this article, COVID-19 lab leak hypothesis#Scientific consensus on likely natural zoonosis from bats. I or other editors might copy additional material, and possibly modify it slightly, from that article into into one in order to contextualize the discussion about a possible laboratory origin with strong scientific references.

Per User:ProcrastinatingReader, I am copying rather than transcluding, so that we can decide what to include at a more granular level. I'm hesitant to take this approach because it can be used to shift text away from what scientific editors have added at SARS-CoV-2 and towards a pro-leak viewpoint that is right dismissed by most scientists. Nevertheless I'm adopting the copying approach in the hopes that we can avoid that pitfall. -Darouet (talk) 12:01, 19 July 2021 (UTC)

You can see the diff of the copying here . -Darouet (talk) 12:03, 19 July 2021 (UTC)

That seems like a good start to me. There's probably more that can be added, but there are editors better versed on the science than me. Perhaps Novem Linguae? ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 12:07, 19 July 2021 (UTC)

ProcrastinatingReader, looks good to me. I'm sure some other people will take a crack at it too :) –Novem Linguae (talk) 12:11, 19 July 2021 (UTC)

COVID-19 lab leak hypothesis and COVID-19 lab leak theory redirect to two separate pages. That can't be right. — Preceding unsigned comment added by Jikybebna (talk • contribs) 08:10, 27 June 2021 (UTC)

Jikybebna, I agree, that will need to be fixed, if/when this survives AfD and the merge discussion.--Shibbolethink ^{(♔ ♕)} 21:14, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

After I wrote that comment, someone redirected both pages to "misinformation". Not exactly what I had in mind but it's better than when they were pointed at different pages. Jikybebna (talk) 22:27, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

• And as of right now, Lab leak theory redirects to Investigations into the origin of COVID-19, Lab leak hypothesis redirects to Nicholas Wade, COVID-19 lab leak conspiracy theory redirects to COVID-19 misinformation, and Lab leak redirects to List of laboratory biosecurity incidents. The last one makes sense. The first 3 reflect just how muddied and politicized the phrase "lab leak" has become. --Animalparty! (talk) 23:08, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

  I went ahead and changed most of these redirects to point here. Might as well centralize everything here. –Novem Linguae (talk) 22:00, 20 July 2021 (UTC)

Following this discussion , I am unblanking this page. Pinging involved admins CambridgeBayWeather, ToBeFree, HighInBC and DGG. Courtesy pings to involved editors: Arcturus, Jweiss11, Extraordinary Writ and Jclemens, Loksmythe, Hobit, SmokeyJoe, Robert McClenon, 力, Goszei, Adoring nanny, Almaty, Forich, Terjen Empiricus-sextus, My very best wishes, Kashmiri, SMcCandlish, Drbogdan Geogene, Dream_Focus, and Guest2625. I have also written an essay on why Wikipedia should have a page on this hypothesis, regardless of whether it is proven or disproven in the end. Happy editing. CutePeach (talk) 11:20, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

Note: just to make it more clear, we're talking about Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2021 June 7 -- RoySmith (talk) 13:32, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

Hi CutePeach, you have restored the discussed text, with exactly one modification: Removing the maintenance templates. Which part of "this particular draft isn't worth restoring" and "write a new article" in the closure is unclear? ~ ToBeFree (talk) 11:28, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

• Unblanking looks highly problematic, especially as it seems to involve misrepresentation of what was agreed (maybe, a new draft). Alexbrn (talk) 11:31, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

@ToBeFree:, this version of the article is different to the deleted one . I was just about to start making improvements and then it got blanked again. Whatever happened to Wikipedia:Wikipedia is a work in progress? Some of the sections in the body need rewriting for style and clarity, but otherwise the article is largely faithful to the sources cited.

RoySmith, were you aware that this version of the draft was published as an article? Unblanking was clearly alluded to in the deletion review. CutePeach (talk) 12:25, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

The deletion review was of a draft. This misreading of the close, and the above ping list heavily loaded with wiki-friends, all smells pretty bad. Alexbrn (talk) 12:29, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

That revision has way too many issues for it to be reasonable to expect people to vet for policy compliance. It also has the problem of being exhaustingly repetitive on quotes and for omitting a lot of details. I also agree that a new draft should be started. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 12:39, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

Ah. I looked at the timestamps and noticed that, as you can verify in Special:Diff/1009196063/1034189301 (2021-02-27 equal to today), the restored revision of the article already long existed at time of the deletion review (2021-06-07). ~ ToBeFree (talk) 12:49, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

@ToBeFree: did the deletion review of the draft have any bearing on this related article? Once we hear back from RoySmith on whether he knew about this article and what Jweiss11,SmokeyJoe and DGG meant about removing the redirect, can you please decide on whether we move this article back to draftspace or unblank it? I have pinged the above editors, not because they are my wiki-friends, but because they have expressed interest in building an encyclopedic entry on this notable topic. CutePeach (talk) 13:19, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

I'm in two minds about this. On one hand, I'd say a MfD discussion usually doesn't affect a different mainspace article about the same topic as the discussed draft. On the other hand, the exact restored revision did exist during the latest discussion, that discussion happened less than a month ago, and the usual approach to create an AfD discussion about this would probably exhaust the community's patience (IDHT/FORUMSHOP). The whole situation isn't ideal. The easiest way out of the mess is to write an entirely new article about the topic from scratch, here in mainspace. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:22, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

.... which would be a recipe for a fringey WP:POVFORK. Alexbrn (talk) 13:29, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

...to which a normal response would be improvement or a proper AfD discussion leading to a general result about the topic, not the current content. ~ ToBeFree (talk) 13:31, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

But there's a consensus (at DRV) that the page may exist at that title. I agree with that opinion. I also think restarting in mainspace is better, because in draftspace it's usually just like-minded people working on it, and thus the end product is more slanted on something contentious like this, and then people will call for it to be deleted. That is, in my mind, a procedural wrangling. If it's stubbified and then expanded collaboratively, it's more likely to be NPOV. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 13:32, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

That outcome mentions a "new draft", in bold. Alexbrn (talk) 13:53, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

I used the word "draft" as well above, but meant the actual definition of the word (ie starting all over again), and not as a shorthand for "the draft namespace". I suspect Roy used it in the same way. The close adds: There was a running thread about the proper use of mainspace vs draft vs userspace vs POVFORK for controversial new article; I don't see any particular consensus there, which in turn means I'm not going to make any statement about where such a new attempt should be written. Draftspace is also not mandated by any policy, for anything, about anything.

@Alexbrn: this revert with the summary POVFORK indicates that you fundamentally disagree with the consensus established at Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2021 June 7 and will not accept any article at this title. You cannot simply ignore a community consensus as closed by an uninvolved administrator. If you think it's a POVFORK, gain consensus for your view at WP:AFD. ProcrastinatingReader (talk) 13:58, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

@ToBeFree:, I am confused. If this is the text of the deleted draft , then this article is a much improved version, and shouldn’t be affected by the outcome of the MfD. From my understanding, the deletion review was a review of procedure, not the outcome of the MfD. I can start a new article but I just want to understand our predicament better. CutePeach (talk) 13:48, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

There has never been consensus for a standalone article, this is dealt with in the misinformation article and the investigation article, where it makes better sense per WP:NOPAGE. There is no reason to single it out as the one "hypothesis" that needs a special standalone article, and many reasons why this would be a bad idea. Alexbrn (talk) 13:51, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

• At least one page on this topic by itself is inevitable: This topic may have once been fringe, but is no longer fringe, so that consideration is irrelevant. (I can seetwo: one for the original fringe hypothesis, one for the science as it develops, and one for the political controversy. It's even possible there may turn out to be sufficient RW coverage to justify one on the WP handling of the subject. , It is probably but not certainly incorrect, but there's been too much discussion of the possibility to not warrant a separate article. Whether there should then be a section on the page this is presently redirected to can be discussed afterwards. (I personally think a redirect would be appropriate, because it just possibly might be looked for there. DGG ( talk ) 13:56, 18 July 2021 (UTC)
• Since I was pinged here (as the DRV closer), I'll comment. I do need to make clear however that I'm firmly not wading into content issues, just process. So, here's what I see:
  • This is the version of Draft:COVID-19 lab leak hypothesis which was the subject of Wikipedia:Miscellany for deletion/Draft:COVID-19 lab leak hypothesis and Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2021 June 7.
  • I also see User:Boing! said Zebedee/COVID-19 lab leak theory which is substantially identical, so I assume there's been some copy-paste going on, which is a problem. Don't do that.
  • Looking at this version of COVID-19 lab leak hypothesis noted as "unblanking as per Wikipedia:Deletion review/Log/2021 June 7" by CutePeach, I haven't figured out where that came from. Given the length, I'm assuming it's not all new text, which means it really needs to have proper attribution. Something like "reverting back to version xxxxx as per ...." would have been more appropriate.
  • I also see that while I've been writing this, ProcrastinatingReader has started on a brand new version of COVID-19 lab leak hypothesis in mainspace (Special:Diff/1034204447) that appears to be from scratch. This is fully in compliance with my DRV close, so carry on. -- RoySmith (talk) 14:01, 18 July 2021 (UTC)

Let's carry on with the version pointed by RoySmith above. On a related but different note: What ever happened to the OP of the first draft, ScrupulousScribe? Forich (talk) 00:16, 19 July 2021 (UTC)

Forich, I think he was indef'd for sockpuppeting. Looks like that was on Feb 19, 2021. –Novem Linguae (talk) 10:43, 19 July 2021 (UTC)

• Stop blanking the page. Multiple editors are working in good faith to get this article into shape, and legislative-style negotiation over non-public drafts is not how we best do things. The topic in general is clearly encyclopedic, and the material we have so far is very well-sourced, so it's simply a matter of polishing out any accidental or (at least in theory) intentional WP:OR or WP:POV-pushing that could be present, and keeping this within WP:DUE and WP:FRINGE limits.  — SMcCandlish ☏ ¢ 😼  03:05, 21 July 2021 (UTC)