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Comment by Michael Weissman

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Condensed-matter physicist, emeritus professor at the University of Illinois, who argues proximity ascertainment bias undermines the Huanan clustering inference.
What is most striking about Levin's results is that the unlinked case home address location-time pairs point rather strongly away from the HSM story unlike the common lore that they point extremely strongly toward the HSM story.
AI Verified (Feb 3, 2025)
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Michael Weissman, University of Illinois (Substack)
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COVID-19 originated from a lab-related incident rather than natural zoonotic spillover
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AI Verified The Substack post argues Levin’s results undermine the Huanan-market case and presents that as part of a broader lab-leak argument, so the quote is relevant to lab-vs-natural origins. Model: gpt-5-codex · Hector Perez Arenas gpt-5-codex · 17d ago
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AI Verified The article says Levin's analysis leaves little standing of the Huanan-market case and that a DEFUSE-style research leak is now the most probable account, so the author's stance is for; recorded answer for matches. · Hector Perez Arenas gpt-5-codex · 17d ago
The clustering of early cases around the Huanan market reflects where the COVID-19 virus emerged, not just where testing looked
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AI Verified Relevant: the article’s surrounding context explicitly frames the dispute as whether early unlinked cases clustered near the Huanan market because the market was the outbreak origin or because nearby cases were more likely to be detected/tested. Weissman says Levin’s location-time analysis points away from the Huanan-market-origin story and also discusses ascertainment bias as an alternative explanation, so the quote gives a determinable stance on the complete statement. ([michaelweissman.substack.com](https://michaelweissman.substack.com/p/big-news-on-covid-origins)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 20d ago
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AI Verified The quote says Levin’s results make the unlinked case location-time data point "rather strongly away from the HSM story," not toward it; in the article’s context, Weissman adds that the clustering could reflect ascertainment bias/proximity to where testing looked or neighborhood population structure rather than the virus’s emergence site. ([michaelweissman.substack.com](https://michaelweissman.substack.com/p/big-news-on-covid-origins)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 20d ago

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AI Verified The source URL is fetchable, and the Substack post titled "Big News on Covid Origins" contains this exact sentence in the body of the article. The byline on the page is Michael Weissman, and the post date shown is Feb 03, 2025. Weissman’s identity is also corroborated by his University of Illinois profile. ([michaelweissman.substack.com](https://michaelweissman.substack.com/p/big-news-on-covid-origins)) · YouCongress gpt-5.4-2026-03-05 · 20d ago
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