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Comment by nradov | Hacker News Reader

It matters. Zoonotic viruses that jump to humans naturally tend to be less well adapted to human biology, and thus less contagious. That potentially gives us more time to respond before they evolve really dangerous human adapted variants. Whereas GoF research using human tissue or transgenic animals can produce viruses that are perfectly adapted to humans right out of the gate.

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That’s true. I don’t remember any other viruses being this contagious for a long time. Avian flu, swine flu, not nearly as contagious as Delta and spreading asymptomatically.

Ebola - not as contagious. Perhaps AIDS was the closest.

Measles, Chickenpox, Rubella, Mumps, Polio, Pertussis, Smallpox, HIV as you mentioned, SARS, Diphteria and the common cold all have basic reproduction numbers >= original Covid, per wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Basic_reproduction_number

None of them were “novel” or recently appeared — as the ones I mentioned

What’s your definition of “recent”? Some of us remember when HIV starting infecting our friends. It doesn’t seem that long ago to me.

I mentioned HIV in my comment, speaking about recent. The reply mentioned all kinds of viruses besides HIV that weren’t recent — so it was a strawman.

… and yet hiv doesn’t spread by simple being close to somebody. How can you say it’s as much as contagious as covid?

AIDS, (HIV) spent a long time in human the population before it became a serious problem.

Right. I didn’t really mean the speed but the infectiousness, because people were asymptomatic when infecting each other during the incubation period. It was just really long with AIDS

hey, aren't you the "kids without comorbid conditions are not at serious risk from covid" guy? how's it going with that? And sheesh, to think you were the one calling others ignorant…

still giving out medical advice I see! ;)

What a bizarre, off-topic comment. Why would you think that a discussion about the risks of GoF research constitutes medical advice?

We are fortunate that most children are at minimal risk from COVID-19 death. The CDC estimated the infection fatality rate for the 0-17 age group at about 0.001%. Most of those who died had a serious underlying condition such as obesity, diabetes, asthma, cancer, or congenital heart disease.

https://www.cdc.gov/coronavirus/2019-ncov/cases-updates/burd...

https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-021-02423-8

He'd still be right. Or are you saying kids without comorbidities are at a serious risk of dying? Because that would be literal misinformation

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