Simon, Thank you for for yet another thought-provoking article. As as you say, demanding accountability from lab workers, as opposed to PIs, institutions & funders, may be counter-productive.
Of course, accountability at some level is essential, especially if the work is of the GOFROC kind. The other point that struck a chord is the importance of US biosafety regulations. That is the only reason I am so invested in the Paul-Peters Act and related developments in the US.
By far the most interesting work you have written so far.
Thank you.
In my own experience bioinformatics signs of institutional interaction with instances of Lab Acquired Infections and dangerous DURC are not difficult to obtain, but the researchers involved react viscerally to any suggestion that their work has dangers that are otherwise quite obvious; narrow benefits for them and broad and catastrophic risks for everyone everywhere forever after…
What institutional instruments do you propose can be effective in situations where missing data is quite obvious and yet the Universities involved are reluctant to engage with STS and bioinformatics researchers?
These are not difficult issues to find interesting questions in LAI related areas of COVID Origin research …
Even the Genbank SARS-CoV-2 reference sequence has been suppressed for a time without an explanation I have read;
Please get in contact if these links to archives do not work or you are otherwise genuinely interested in seeing some level of accountability in this area of concern.
Simon, Thank you for for yet another thought-provoking article. As as you say, demanding accountability from lab workers, as opposed to PIs, institutions & funders, may be counter-productive.
Of course, accountability at some level is essential, especially if the work is of the GOFROC kind. The other point that struck a chord is the importance of US biosafety regulations. That is the only reason I am so invested in the Paul-Peters Act and related developments in the US.
Dear Simon
By far the most interesting work you have written so far.
Thank you.
In my own experience bioinformatics signs of institutional interaction with instances of Lab Acquired Infections and dangerous DURC are not difficult to obtain, but the researchers involved react viscerally to any suggestion that their work has dangers that are otherwise quite obvious; narrow benefits for them and broad and catastrophic risks for everyone everywhere forever after…
What institutional instruments do you propose can be effective in situations where missing data is quite obvious and yet the Universities involved are reluctant to engage with STS and bioinformatics researchers?
These are not difficult issues to find interesting questions in LAI related areas of COVID Origin research …
Even the Genbank SARS-CoV-2 reference sequence has been suppressed for a time without an explanation I have read;
https://url.au.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/RSUvCE8wRRtV33m5TwhPu7k9ZL?domain=ncbi.nlm.nih.gov
Data has been deleted;
https://url.au.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/sQ9fCGv066UK11m5ipiLuBmfTk?domain=science.org
Ongoing cybersecurity and related data integrity issues have been ignored;
https://url.au.m.mimecastprotect.com/s/u08VCMwG88tMqqg4tGCMu8GgZn?domain=web.archive.org
Or worse, simply made to disappear when the submitting authors find this possibly convenient?
For example;
<<Yu,P., Hu,B., Li,B., Luo,D., Zhu,G., Zhang,L., Holmes,E.C., Shi,Z. and Cui,J.>>
https:/web.archive.org/web/20220809085043/https:/www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/?term=Spread+and+Geographic+Structure+of+SARS-related+Coronaviruses+in+++++++++++++Bats+and+the+Origin+of+Human+SARS+Coronavirus
Please get in contact if these links to archives do not work or you are otherwise genuinely interested in seeing some level of accountability in this area of concern.
Kind regards
Tommy Cleary