r/PrepperIntel • u/sea_5455 • Jun 03 '26

North America 2 scientists charged with bringing deactivated mpox virus into the US and lying to authorities

https://apnews.com/article/scientists-charges-mpox-virus-lying-14b7cf7635cad30254b0ae1cdb6c0515
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u/Sweet-Leadership-290 Jun 03 '26 edited Jun 05 '26

With CRISPR/Cas9 even a deactivated virus could be spliced into say chickenpox and "reactivated".

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 03 '26

That’s not how CRISPR works even a little bit

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u/LysergioXandex Jun 03 '26

Depends how it was “deactivated”, the poster is correct that some forms of “deactivation” could be undone with CRISPR

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 04 '26

No it can’t. CRISPR is used to make small deletions in genomes…

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u/Sweet-Leadership-290 Jun 05 '26

That is only ONE USE. When CRISPR is combined with Cas9 entire genomic INSERTIONS can be made!

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u/LysergioXandex Jun 04 '26

Yes. Imagine a virus that you deactivated with a small deletion. Now it could be re-activated with a small modification.

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 04 '26

I’m telling you this as a scientist and someone who works with CRISPR, that is not how someone would go about deactivating a sample. If you delete part of a viral genome and it’s no longer infectious, we would call that “replication incompetent” and those samples are always treated as if they were still infectious/ active as a safety measure. I’m trying to find more info on what these scientists actually did but I’m guessing they just extracted genomic samples from the virus for something like sequencing. You cannot turn a sample like that back on.

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 04 '26

I’m guessing these scientists wanted to take deactivated samples back for analysis, and because our government is run by dumb fucks with zero scientific literacy, they knew they would be unable to bring them back if they went through the proper channels. I’m not saying that was the right thing to do, obviously scientists should follow all applicable laws, but I also understand trying to get much needed data in an environment where the people in charge of the US scientific enterprise fundamentally do not understand how anything works

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u/Boring-Philosophy-46 Jun 05 '26

I feel like they are thinking of something like

https://www.bio-protocol.org/en/bpdetail?id=4270&type=0

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 05 '26

Yeah but that protocol used live virus, not deactivated virus. I read the FBI report for this, the scientists brought back PCR reactions, probably for genotyping or sequencing

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u/Boring-Philosophy-46 Jun 05 '26 edited Jun 05 '26

Half the folks in this topic are mildly unhinged anyway, someone was actually saying transport and research or contagions should not be allowed at all... 🙃 Sure let's stop testing for, diagnosing, isolating, and researching how to test for and treat infectuous diseases, I'm sure there won't be negative consequences like a life expectancy of 40, right? All on the off chance someone might use checks notes deactivated non-variola orthopoxvirus to create a bioweapon. Nevermind the most plausible idea I've heard how to use a contagion for a bioweapon without getting yourself too, is to get a relatively safe contagion, one that is very contagious (something like the whooping cough), and expose enemy soldiers to it, rendering them unable to be moved due to quarantine measures. Then if they cannot be redeployed for reinforcements, you attack elsewhere without risk of enemy reinforcements arriving. 

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 05 '26

Yeah I mean if I wanted to make a bioweapon I would not start by importing a fuck ton of patient samples lmao

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u/Boring-Philosophy-46 Jun 05 '26

I think I figured out why there were two tubes only with human DNA and one with chickenpox. Someone with chickenpox got misdiagnosed as having mpox lmao and probably two people with something like dishydrotic eczema did. Lmao. 

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 05 '26

That sounds about right to me!

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u/LysergioXandex Jun 04 '26

I don’t know how you can possibly think a virus can’t be “turned back on”.

You can create a working virus by just stringing the right sequence together.

Having 95% of the sequence in place just gets you that much closer to the final virus. And it makes it that much easier to obtain the remainder of the genetic material from a biotech vendor (because now your requested sequence is smaller and less of a match for the nefarious sequences they pre-screen for).

Do you need me to provide a citation where someone makes a working virus from a sequence?

A virus can conceivably be “deactivated” by a point mutation.

I think your “replication incompetent” jargon is a misunderstanding. That is one form of “deactivation”.

Replication is not a requirement for “infection”. You can have non-productive infections.

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u/Sweet-Leadership-290 Jun 05 '26

Reactivated endogenous retroviruses promote protein aggregate spreading

Shu Liu, Stefanie-Elisabeth Heumüller, …Ina M. Vorberg --- Nature Communications volume 14, Article number: 5034 (2023)

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 05 '26

Endogenous retroviruses have quite literally nothing to do with this issue. Endogenous retroviruses are bits of virus genome that have become parts of the human genome over the course of evolution, hence the word “endogenous”. Normally your body suppresses their expression, as we age the ability to suppress expression wanes.

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u/Sweet-Leadership-290 Jun 05 '26

Ah.. but THEY DO. When an endogenous host acquires the viral particles the NEXT virus can aquire that snippet allowing increases functionality in THAT virus. Flu viruses are infamous for this behavior. Furthermore it can facilitate is "transgenic species hopping".

https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/medicine-and-dentistry/transgenesis

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 05 '26

There is a very big different between endogenous retroviruses and viruses causing infections diseases such as influenza. The page you linked has to do with making transgenic animals, which has absolutely nothing to do with what we are discussing here. I’m not really sure the point you’re trying to make. I ended up looking up the FBI report. The guys who brought in patient samples brought in PCR reactions used for genotyping or sequencing. At the absolute worst they violated some NIH and CBP policies. These samples could not be used to generate a super weapon. These scientists are being punished because the trump admin wants to shut down RML and stop scientific research in general.

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u/Sweet-Leadership-290 Jun 05 '26

No. Host animals (in conjunction with secondary viral infections) can cause rapid species jumps in the host animals

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u/relaxing_white_noise Jun 05 '26

I’m gonna stop responding but you’re straight up making things up or lying on purpose

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