183
votes
Accepted
Do studies show that viruses are contagious?
A qualified doctor challenging the Germ Theory of Disease after 1900? Wow.
This is just a smattering - just a random tasting - of the thousands - or perhaps millions - of studies showing that ...
- 141k
143
votes
Accepted
Is 8% of human DNA from viruses?
Normal viruses infect cells in order to take advantage of cellular mechanisms to reproduce themselves. A class of viruses known as "retroviruses" have a slightly peculiar mechanism to achieve this - ...
- 6,678
89
votes
Has a virus ever escaped a high-level virus lab "such as the one in Wuhan"?
Q Has a virus ever escaped a high-level virus lab?
Yes, depending on definitions.
How deadly pathogens have escaped the lab — over and over again
Most appropriate candidates for an inappropriately ...
- 44.1k
80
votes
Accepted
Was the virus which causes COVID-19 made in a Chinese lab?
Biological and genetic analysis of the virus suggests that the virus evolved naturally, i.e. was not "made in a Chinese lab".
However, as Lang Lang's answer notes, it is arguably premature ...
- 936
48
votes
Has the flu already killed 20,000 Americans during 2019-20 flu season?
Fox News links to the CDC source which says:
CDC estimates that so far this season there have been at least 34 million flu illnesses, 350,000 hospitalizations and 20,000 deaths from flu.
By "...
tim♦
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24
votes
Was the virus which causes COVID-19 made in a Chinese lab?
It is still too early to definitively tell. We do not know its origin for sure.
We have neither any hard evidence for nor anything good against this claim. What we do have is a few plausibility ...
- 44.1k
21
votes
In February 2020, did Tencent release accurate statistics for the Wuhan coronavirus that were 10 times the official figures?
The Tencent screenshot is almost certainly a hoax, for the simple reason that such screenshots are extremely easy to fake. For example, here's how easy it is to get a "screenshot" of the New York ...
- 319
20
votes
Coronavirus - Is it safe to receive a package from China?
In an attempt to back up the WHO's claim but not using their data or statement.
The 'Corona 2019' virus is a specific variant of the more general corona virus family. Further, this family is part of a ...
- 300
20
votes
Does SARS-CoV-2 infect via asymptomatic transmission?
There is actual scientific evidence for asymptomatic Sars cov 2 transmission.
I found about 50 scientific publications in the peer-reviewed literature that clarify this information (in a 10-minute ...
19
votes
Coronavirus - Is it safe to receive a package from China?
You are quoting the WHO and then say 'no citation is provided'. The WHO is the source. They are well equipped to research these kind of questions and it is part of their job to issue recommendations ...
- 1,604
18
votes
Has SARS-CoV-2 been purified in a lab? If not, does this imply that the PCR test for it is not specific?
It is essentially irrelevant whether the virus was purified, and the reason it wasn't in the cases that the Youtube video mentioned is that it simply was not necessary or useful to add a purification ...
- 43.6k
17
votes
Do surgical masks help prevent the spread of COVID-19 from infected members of the public?
We finally have a study that examines surgical masks and their effectiveness under different viral-load situations and compares their effectiveness to other types of masks. The research provides the ...
16
votes
Has the flu already killed 20,000 Americans during 2019-20 flu season?
The number of confirmed deaths due to influenza has been much less than 20,000 for the 2019-2020 flu season through March 5th 2020.
According the the US National Center for Health Statistics, the ...
- 106k
14
votes
Has SARS-CoV-2 been purified in a lab? If not, does this imply that the PCR test for it is not specific?
The whole you-didn't-image-this-in-a-highly-purified-sample is a red herring with regard to determining whether a (suspected) virus is a "a brand new viral pathogen" or not. Nobody does that ...
- 59.8k
13
votes
Accepted
Does a child die from malaria every two minutes?
According to the World Health Organization:
More than two thirds (70%) of all malaria deaths occur in this age group. In 2015, about 305,000 African children died before their fifth birthdays.
...
- 30.3k
13
votes
Does this article make a valid claim that SARS-CoV-2 isolation hasn't been demonstrated yet?
This claim seems to have originated from a profound misunderstanding of the word "quantified", perhaps an unfortunate consequence of the technical shorthand that scientists like to use.
The ...
- 1,934
10
votes
What is the cause of Brazil's microcephaly outbreak?
Summary
Based on current evidence, the Zika virus appears to be the likely cause of Brazil's microcephaly outbreak.
There is limited evidence to support pyriproxyfen as a cause, but further, more ...
- 22.7k
10
votes
Does SARS-CoV-2 infect via asymptomatic transmission?
There are many techniques that have been used to demonstrate the importance of asymptomatic or pre symptomatic transmission of SARS-CoV-2. Many of these are population/statistically based, which you ...
- 993
8
votes
Accepted
Are 40% of the oceans' bacteria killed by viruses every day?
According to Bacteriophage Distributions and Temporal Variability in the Ocean’s Interior mBio Nov/Dec 2017 Volume 8, e01903-17:
Phages have been
shown to kill hosts at rates of up to 20 to 40% of ...
- 106k
8
votes
Is 8% of human DNA from viruses?
I wish to add to the above answer. Approximately 9% of the genome is viral in origin, but current research suggests there is less of 'you' than there are other viral related sequences. Here is a very ...
- 637
7
votes
Does dry air promote the spreading of respiratory viruses better than wet air, ceteris paribus?
This is a rather tentative answer since the evidence still looks fairly contradictory to me, but the BBC has an article that reiterates what DW says, with more detail:
Thanks to the laws of ...
- 59.8k
6
votes
Accepted
Does rabies in humans cause aggression?
Yes, there are two ways in which untreated rabies can develop, one, affecting roughly 70% of untreated people, is called "furious rabies" and leads to dramatic changes in behaviour. From the ...
- 8,931
6
votes
What is the cause of Brazil's microcephaly outbreak?
The CDC now say the Zika virus is the cause.
On April 13, 2016, a new report was published by doctors from the CDC in the New England Journal of Medicine.
Zika Virus and Birth Defects — Reviewing the ...
- 141k
6
votes
Was the virus which causes COVID-19 made in a Chinese lab?
As has been stated, there is no evidence that such is the origin. From the other direction, the phylogeny of the virus seems to indicate that it diverged from an existing virus in bats. And, that ...
- 177
6
votes
Why is the estimated fatality rate of the 2019-nCoV virus so low?
Take a look at this live map of the virus. The calculation is based on the number of deaths, divided by the number of confirmed cases (multiplied by 100 to get it as a percent%).
As of February 3rd ...
- 2,354
6
votes
Has a virus ever escaped a high-level virus lab "such as the one in Wuhan"?
According to Agro-terrorism :
"Accidental releases of FMD virus from research laboratories have occurred in the United Kingdom [reference 38]. Historically, FMD virus was accidentally released from ...
- 106k
5
votes
Accepted
Were millions of people infected by SARS?
No.
The premise behind the article seems to be that SARS was widely prevalent (in some areas), >10% of people were infected, without severe symptoms, and developed antibodies that can now be tested ...
- 141k
5
votes
Accepted
Was the yellow fever virus a past standardized biological weapon in the US Army?
The word "standardized" seems like an over-statement to me. The US certainly did investigate the possibility of using yellow fever as a bioweapon during the Cold War, according to Hay (1999):
The ...
- 7,390
5
votes
Do surgical masks help prevent the spread of COVID-19 from infected members of the public?
First, surgical masks (especially doubled up) work fine for keeping you safe from aerosols. Cloth masks also work to some extent, but not quite as much. This has been shown in a number of studies, but ...
- 5,487
5
votes
Is there a million € reward for proof of Sars cov 2 isolation?
This is a trick developed by Stefan Lanka, who is a close associate of Samuel Eckert. He has already created an identical reward for isolation of the measles virus. Under German law, they do not ...
- 44.9k
Only top scored, non community-wiki answers of a minimum length are eligible