The Trumpist attacks on China make the most sense as being for the domestic political audience. The Chinese coverup of anything that makes CCP rule seem imperfect is SOP. I mean seriously, that guy in charge is afraid of a talking teddy bear.
It requires one heck of a lot crazy state system to do something that crazy. Not saying that such crazy states don't exist.
We also have no idea where the outbreak started, only where the first hotspot was.
Then again, it may very well be the case that Wuhan was not the place of the first transmission to humans, just the one were it first happened on a large enough scale to be noticed and recognized as something new.
I think there's not enough evidence to dismiss any of the transmission routes.
Not really, if they've been coexisting with the virus for a while they could be somewhat immune already. Also, you cannot compare the impact of an outbreak in a rural town in Laos vs. Wuhan with 11 million people and much more international commuters.
Worth to find out if there are places around Laos where level of COVID infections was lower and people may have such immunity ?
"Lethal Pneumonia Cases in Mojiang Miners (2012)" https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fpubh.2021.7021...
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/bat-cave-solves-m...
Supposedly that's the closest related virus?