zlacker

That's not enough to draw any conclusion - authoritarian governments led by a tiny few are the geopolitical equivalent of a schizophrenic. The smaller the group with absolute power, the more individual personalities, arbitrary interests, and even day-to-day mood dominate the decision making process. The more power is distributed beyond the group, the more policies return to the mean and the less it varies from day to day.

China has the added wrinkle that it's so large that national authorities policies' can vary wildly from local and regional responses for a long time while the bureaucrats play a game of telephone.

>>akisel+(OP)
That’s a fair point. The response is not conclusive evidence.

I still think the response is more consistent with a lab leak, even when bureaucratic schizophrenia is accounted for, but that expected level of noise makes it impossible to conclude anything definitively.