Cross-posted from: https://feddit.de/post/8224710
China has reportedly embarked on a controversial path of experimenting with a new Covid-like virus, characterized by a 100% fatality rate in mice. The unfolding scenario raises concerns about the potential risks associated with such experiments, especially the prospect of the virus spilling over into the human population.
Flu type viruses have three phases: incubation, infection, fatality.
It’s imaginable that a virus with very short incubation and infection phases, could be delivered to a target population either via the water supply, or by directly spraying it over them.
A virus with long incubation, but short infection and quick fatality phases. Could be risked to be let go freely, and still reasonably expect to be able to contain the target population.
If the virus also took into account additional markers to control the duration and severity of each phase, then theoretically.you could design a virus that gave a mild flu to everyone, but at the same time quickly killed some target population, or even a single individual with a 100% fatality rate (for the intended target).