> The benefits of the research (extremely minor) don't seem to justify the risk.
There's an entire industry that literally harvests tons of bat guano for fertilizer that's shipped around the world and preventative research carried out by a few scientists is where you draw the line?
Bats fill several important ecological niches globally and based on hendra virus outbreaks in Australia alone, it's clear that interacting with them in the wild is inevitable. Pretending they don't exist is only going to leave us unprepared and defenseless.
It is not equivalent tho is it? There’s a large difference between actually capturing a bat and extracting its saliva, and obtaining bat guano via an industrial process. We know that covid jumps from humans to cats and dogs simply by being in proximity with them - so actually capturing bats is going to be vastly more risky.
We know there is a huge downside risk. Dismissing that with non-equivalent whataboutism doesn’t change that. What is the benefit of this research that justifies a non-zero chance of sparking pandemic 2.0?
COVID jumps from humans to cats and dogs because the virus is well adapted to our lungs and throat, where it's easily aerosolized and expelled. Bats are a completely different organism with different adaptations.
Most viruses that live in bats get shed through their feces which animals and humans come into contact with quite frequently in the wild (again, just look at hendra outbreaks). Chances are, even more people are exposed to the droppings in industrial settings before the sterilization step. A few scientists handling bats with protective gear is a drop in the bucket to real world exposure and it's hardly whataboutism when it's about research meant to protect the whatabouts.
There's an entire industry that literally harvests tons of bat guano for fertilizer that's shipped around the world and preventative research carried out by a few scientists is where you draw the line?
Bats fill several important ecological niches globally and based on hendra virus outbreaks in Australia alone, it's clear that interacting with them in the wild is inevitable. Pretending they don't exist is only going to leave us unprepared and defenseless.