Given the large amount of scientific progress in the last 20-40 years, it is of high interest wondering the ways it will shift and change as time passes. The Wuhan institute of virology as well as now cancelled research labs in the United States have promoted a field of inquiry into how viruses transmit, spread, and become lethal to humans.

This method of inquiry is known as gain of function research

In this post, we expose some critical flaws and how potentially gain of function research can lead to a massive outbreak of a new novel infection, possible a ‘pandemic’. Now, while writing, we don’t accuse any institution of engineering any type of viral particle on purpose for the sake of promoting ideologies, but, what we did do is expose how this scientific research might actually harm us later were we not to be careful. We also give ways to conduct safer research from a wiser point of view, so as not to risk a pandemic or severely harm employees.

Gain of Function: Risks

Gain of function research is a basic method for analyzing viral particles that aren’t at all deadly to humans and infect only other animals. The aim is to modify them and see how this affects the way humans will be infected. What is it that’s making a virus once exclusive to bats (for example) start infecting humans now? This is the basic rationale behind the research, while not in-depth. What might be some risks when labs undergo this type of research?

  1. Having employees become sick during the process

    this can happen because the lab might not have ‘quality control’ or ‘means of destroying lethal particles’ and accidental exposure by scientists. If severe, it could cause complications later in life or just expose risk when it isn’t needed (we’ll explain later).

  2. Having a local or global outbreak

    were research labs around the world to be conducting this type of research and facilities not to be able to prohibit exposure, what could happen more often is accidental exposure to the now human transmissible viral particle. This could lead to epidemics and pandemics which we aren’t prepared for, economically, socially, nor politically as many have argued and observed during this covid-19 pandemic.

The safer alternative

We show the current reasoning behind gain of function, that since we changed X in the particle, and human to human transmission is possible, X is associated with it.

\[\square (\chi \land \beta) \to (\chi \to \beta).\]

where $\chi = \text{changed X in particle}$ and $\beta = \text{human to human transmission possible}$. So that if we need both to be true, we can say that one implied the other, we use the order of time to make the last implication true at the end.

This works, but it exposes us to a large risk: sickness, the thought of a new viral particle, and major strain globally trying to destroy it if it leaks.

What’s the other way of doing this, so as to be safe? We explain…

  1. Use viral particles that we already have known cures for, or can’t possibly affect anyone severely. Common cold?
  2. Make that particle weaker and find out what makes a virus not transmissible to humans.

This way if the same accidental leakage occurs, most scientists won’t be harmed and the threat of a pandemic is very slim. The reasoning is…

\[\square (\chi \land \neg \beta) \to (\chi \to \neg \beta).\]

All we did was change the outcome the virus is not human to human transmissible. The goal is to make it less transmissible as an aim rather than more. The previous method was to make it more transmissible which directly implies a risk of a new novel infection. The other way is unintentional if any harm does happen, and it is very unlikely that taking away features will make the virus more transmissible. It is a safer bet. Perhaps something like this if people still want to know what makes human-to-human transmission possible.

Remark: even then…what could knowledge of human to human transmission do in terms of aiding humanity? Could it lead to better cures for current viruses we want eradicated like polio and zika? We already know that polio and zika are human to human in transmission, and thanks to gain of function research, we might know how it happened. But…people are still being sick, does this knowledge have anything to do with cures for current viral infections? If not, is it really worth pursuing?

The threat of a global planned pandemic is more likely with gain of function research, what might this mean for times ahead? Are we headed toward better times for us all or are we just playing with nature and getting hurt? What is plainly said that if a pandemic is planned, the chance of it and the means are available. Funding scientific research of this type exposes us to having it be less surprising. Be selective of scientific research to first have humanity be prosperous globally.

⨳ “think freely, anytime, anywhere.”