Those in favour of the lab leak hypothesis point out that the virus showed up on the scene with all the evolutionary capability to spread amongst humans i.e with batteries included.
With previous Sars viruses my understanding is that each zoonotic jump was traceable with examples of previous forms in prior animal hosts to corroborate the lineage.
What makes Covid-19 interesting is that these zoonotic jumps or the gain of functions can be accelerated in the lab with the purpose of preparing us ahead of time for a dangerous forms of Sars style viruses. It looks like covid-19 may be that type of strain, not man made, but given the lab conditions for it to gain the capability. It may have escaped.
It's worth exploring the lab leak hypothesis but I would say that it's not politically expedient for any of the scientists or parties involved. We will never really know the truth and that is something we need to grow comfortable with.
My understanding is that A) is very much possible because it has happened before (SARS), but we have no evidence yet (and might never acquire).
For B) however, from my limited understanding, there is no strong evidence. We only know about a fraction of existing coronaviruses out there and given we observe one, that has caused a pandemic, the (conditional!) probability that it is well adapted is extremely high (survivorship bias).
If you have a credible source that claims B) please share it.
> What's more, Wuhan Institute of Virology scientists have for the past five years been engaged in so-called "gain of function" (GOF) research, which is designed to enhance certain properties of viruses for the purpose of anticipating future pandemics. Gain-of-function techniques have been used to turn viruses into human pathogens capable of causing a global pandemic.
> This is no nefarious secret program in an underground military bunker. The Wuhan lab received funding, mostly for virus discovery, in part from a ten-year, $200 million international program called PREDICT, funded by the U.S. Agency for International Development and other countries.
What I'm saying is that we don't have strong (any?) evidence that SARS-CoV-2 is the result of gain of function research. It is entirely possible but the majority of the scientists who do gain of function research say it's unlikely (given what we know today, which might change).
Again, a credible source saying the opposite is appreciated.
[1] https://ge.usembassy.gov/fact-sheet-activity-at-the-wuhan-in...
I thought UV resistant organisms were usually referred to as extremophiles because it's so infrequent
There is analysis that suggests that SARS-CoV-2 wasn't engineered. However, if you were intentionally giving it to a bunch of animals in batches with some interspecies mixing, you wouldn't really expect it to look any different than a natural jump.