Steven Quay, in line to be NIAID director, is not just any lab leaker. He is of the type of leakers who still talk about "HIV inserts". He has deleted his tweets from 2021-2025, so here are some screenshots to give you an idea of who Quay is: ▫️1/🧵 #covidorigin #quayniaid

Gregg Gonsalves@gregggonsalves.bsky.social · 21h ago

This is just bat-shit crazy. www.politico.com/news/2026/08...

On ne peut pas dissimuler ce qui n'existe pas ou ce dont on n'a pas connaissance. Pourtant, les tenants d'une origine de labo utilisent à foison le mot "dissimulation" (coverup). C'est une technique typiquement conspirationniste pour justifier l'absence de preuve d'une origine de laboratoire.

Flo Débarre@flodebarre.eurosky.social · 24h ago

Today is the first Tuesday of the month, my (self-imposed) blog posting day -- I wrote about accusations of coverup and conspiracies, thrown without any evidence, in the context of the recent release of private documents by Rand Paul #covidorigin

Today is the first Tuesday of the month, my (self-imposed) blog posting day -- I wrote about accusations of coverup and conspiracies, thrown without any evidence, in the context of the recent release of private documents by Rand Paul #covidorigin

Conspiracies and coverups

There is no evidence for a lab origin of SARS-CoV-2, so commenters default to meta-discourse and accuse scientists of coverups, for which there is no evidence either. So far, available data and scient...

pandemonium.hypotheses.org

People using AI to write: your readers can tell. Your texts become insufferably boring, full of AI-isms (e.g.: it's not this -- it's that) and of stupid statements that seem logical to a machine but are just dumb truisms for humans. Please, don't.

Les vagues de chaleurs et canicules, c'est comme les vagues de Covid-19 : au bout d'un moment il y en a tant qu'on en perd le compte

OK so RFK Jr did say on CNN that "COVID-19", "RSV" and "Lyme disease" came from gain of function research. I've only seen lab leak RSV from some very fringe social media accounts so far; is this a common claim? Source: youtu.be/u-FVCCLsZnQ?... via @atrupar.com

Zach found this recording recently, and it's a crucial piece of evidence that thoroughly refutes a theory put forward by Alina Chan, DRASTIC, and even, according to what we read in Vanity Fair, the FBI. Check his thread! #covidorigin

Zach Hensel@zachhensel.bsky.social · 5d ago

It's a public webinar that Zhengli Shi delivered on March 9, 2020, before a global pandemic had been declared. In this clip from the talk, Shi delineates 4 sarbecovirus lineages. The 8 samples in "Lineage 4" are the ones in the figure most closely related to SARS-CoV-2.

@insee.fr released France's daily deaths up to 30/6 so I was curious for Paris (one of the regions hardest hit by the heat in Europe) The impact is "beyond": On Friday 26/6, Paris saw more deaths than on any day during pandemic, incl during its huge wave 1

Must-read article on the beginning of the Bundibugyo epidemic in DRC (or why it's useful to combine pathogen genomics and case data to estimate dates)

Kai Kupferschmidt@kakape.bsky.social · 6d ago

Ebola may have been spreading for months in the DRC before anyone recognized it. A new reconstruction suggests the outbreak was already widespread in the gold-mining town of Mongbwalu by January. It wasn’t officially declared until 15 May. Why did no-one raise the alarm? My story for @science.org 🧪

arXiv has spun out as an independent non-profit like openRxiv. Today they announce their new CEO and founding Board blog.arxiv.org/2026/07/30/a...

arXiv welcomes inaugural CEO and founding Board of Directors

arXiv welcomes inaugural CEO and founding Board of Directors

blog.arxiv.org

The conspiracy theory, laid out by Paul during the hearing, is that research that would have led to SARS-CoV-2 was funded by NIAID, and so Fauci, its former head, is complicit. People would want to cover up the link to US funders. The NIAID-funded project could not have led to SARS-CoV-2.

Stephen Nuñez@socio-steve.bsky.social · 6d ago

I still don't understand the purpose of this conspiracy theory exactly. Why would everyone be trying to cover up that the virus (which was clearly not bioengineered) was loosed through a lab leak as opposed to spread in wet markets?

Solidarité aussi avec les scientifiques du centre @inrae-france.bsky.social Nouvelle-Aquitaine Bordeaux, en particulier du site de Cestas-Pierroton dont les infrastructures de recherche ont été détruites par les flammes. www.inrae.fr/actualites/i...

Des infrastructures de la recherche forestière d’INRAE détruites par les incendies en Gironde

COMMUNIQUE DE PRESSE - Les incendies en Gironde ont détruit près de 80 ha de dispositifs de recherche forestière d’INRAE dont plusieurs observatoires uniques suivis depuis des décennies. Cette perte a...

inrae.fr

"politicizing science remains a vital political tactic." "Wednesday’s hearing was another example of how criticizing scientists has become an important outlet for the [Republican] party – and where relitigating the Covid crisis justifies skepticism of a broad range of science."

Prof Sheena Cruickshank@sheencr.bsky.social · 7d ago

Good summary of what the insanity that was the Fauci hearing yesterday was about- basically a senators vendetta against Fauci and overall an attack on science versus conspiracy theories. An absolute shocking display from the Republican senators involved.

TL;DR: Today, Anthony Fauci appeared before Rand Paul's committee. In the previous days, Paul shamefully published private documents about Fauci, to attack the person since he had nothing else. Fauci pleaded the 5th and did not answer questions; yet the hearing lasted for three hours. #faucihearing

Flo Débarre@flodebarre.eurosky.social · last wk.

THE END ▫️50/50 #faucihearing

I will be following Anthony Fauci's hearing today, and I will post comments in this thread with the hashtag #faucihearing. Feel free to mute it! ▫️1/🧵 www.hsgac.senate.gov

My quote of the day Until this moment, Senator, I think I never really gauged your cruelty or your recklessness… Let us not assassinate this lad further, Senator. You’ve done enough. Have you no sense of decency, sir, at long last? Have you left no sense of decency? Joseph Welch

New set of documents released by Rand Paul's staff before Fauci's hearing today. They found nothing. Paul and other conspiracy theorists keep talking about a lab leak cover-up, but to have one, you need something to coverup. They have not found any evidence, in spite of all their subpoenas.

I am sick of some media uncritically repeating Rand Paul's misrepresentation of Fauci's journal about the Huanan market. In late Jan 2020, it was a common commentary that the market may not be the origin of the outbreak, b/c of a Lancet paper on early cases ▫️1/6 www.paul.senate.gov/wp-content/u...

I am so appalled by Rand Paul's methods. It's so pathetic. He has nothing on Fauci, so he is attacking the person. He released unredacted documents full of private (incl. medical) information and personal comments. Rand Paul is a miserable jealous little man.

Flo Débarre@flodebarre.eurosky.social · last wk.

"Neither HHS nor Paul’s committee alerted Fauci ahead of time that they had obtained his diary and that they planned to publish it in full, according to a person familiar with the matter." This is so vile

"Neither HHS nor Paul’s committee alerted Fauci ahead of time that they had obtained his diary and that they planned to publish it in full, according to a person familiar with the matter." This is so vile

Diary entries, a subpoena and an anticipated clash: Dr. Anthony Fauci and Rand Paul’s long-running battle returns to the Hill | CNN Politics

Even before the US enacted a national shutdown due to the Covid-19 pandemic, Dr. Anthony Fauci pondered whether he might have testified before Congress more than any other official.

edition.cnn.com

People say "lab leak" (singular) but there is in fact a multiple of Covid origin scenarios involving research. Rand Paul wants to use the topic to attack Fauci, but questions asked by his staff draw from a diversity of origin scenarios, including China-only versions. He has nothing. #covidorigin

Remember the CDC shooting? Alina should think about what they might inspire with irresponsible conspiracy theories. I, silly internet jester, am failing to find the funny. apnews.com/article/cdc-...

CDC shooter believed COVID vaccine made him suicidal, his father tells police

A law enforcement official tells The Associated Press that a Georgia man who opened fire Friday on the U.S.

apnews.com

I am usually trying to find some comic relief in the conspiracizing but not today. Today I am thinking about how someone goes from a post doc to being indistinguishable from any other Republican Witch Hunter of Tony Fauci after writing a book w/ a climate change denier.

Un document historique exceptionnel sur la pandémie de Covid-19 a été mis en ligne hier soir par le sénateur US libertarien et complotiste Rand Paul : plus de 1000 pages du journal personnel d'Antony Fauci. ▫️1/6 www.paul.senate.gov/wp-content/u... #covidrorigin

Dear #episky fellows I am working on death excess during the 2003 heat wave in France. I redid come calculations, and found this impressive difference between men and women: about 1/3 of death excess are men, 2/3 are women (consistent with published results) What could be the cause ? #canicule

The document (not its mega-cringe AI generated summary) is gold for anyone interested in the history of Covid And another self-own for Rand Paul and his fellow leakers

Hypoautonomic, BS@hypoautonomic.bsky.social · 2w ago

My god, he even put doodles on it like it's a real diary

Alpe d'Huez day! Two years ago, Marjolein made this clip for the @le-tourdefrance.bsky.social Femmes about how the Alpe is folding without breaking! Enjoy the climb! And the spectacular folds...

It’s the end of an era: we are sunsetting rpubs.com, quartopub.com, and shinyapps.io in favour of connect.posit.cloud. These services are important, but we need to focus our efforts on a single platform (and it’s overall less confusing to have one place to publish everything you do in R or Python).

Life comes at you fast

Jenna Norton@jenna-m-norton.bsky.social · 2w ago

Remember when NIH Director Jay Bhattacharya said there were no banned words and NIH Program Officers were making them up? Here’s the proof he lied: apnews.com/article/cali... I know, Jay Bhattacharya lying is not news. But it’s still really validating to have the admission.

500,000 comments on the OMB proposal seemed huge; it's likely there were in fact fewer of them. The count seems to be the total number of people/entities represented rather than the number of comments 🧪 (h/t @jaspar.bsky.social) Source: www.chrismarcum.com/marcum-blog/...