Where Gladstone residents think COVID originated

There are some wild conspiracy theories out there so we asked what you think.

Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk discusses the current COVID-19 situation at Gladstone Hospital. Picture: Rodney Stevens

THE true story behind COVID-19 is yet to be clearly defined, so we asked Gladstone residents their thoughts about the pandemic that has changed life as we knew it.

A post on the New Gladstone Open Discussion group posed the question “I have heard all sorts of theories about coronavirus (COVID-19).

“They range from “It was created and unleashed by China to gain greater global influence and control” to “This was devised by the powers that be, to cull the human population, as growth was unsustainable and the damage to the planet was heading toward an inevitable end.””

“What do you think?”

Tan Perry kick started things by saying “I think it is simply from the wet markets as stated.”

“It’s craziness, then we get so close to being free and our pollies allow things to happen which cause another outbreak.

“It’ll be interesting to see how Qld is in 2 weeks time.”

Angus Bauman agreed with Tan, posting “Animal virus that made the jump to humans due to the disgusting wet markets in China.”

Masters of Public Health candidate Jaclyn McCosker has just written a research paper on COVID-19 for her studies and said “It’s a zoonotic disease that came from farming animals.” “Seventy five per-cent of all new diseases come from animals, largely from domestic animals sharing a habitat with wild animals.

“It happened many times before (most notably the 1918 pandemic that came out of a US pig farm) and will happen regularly as long as animals are farmed.

“In the 80s/90s there was a rise of farmed meat, like chickens and pigs in Asia, that crowded out low income farmers and pushed them into eating or selling wild animals.

“So an increase of meat intake, plus rapid deforestation of wild areas means humans are being exposed to diseases we’ve never come in contact with before, and we don’t have immunity or medicines for them.

“This is the real explanation without the weird conspiracies.”

Toni Oliver wrote “An inevitable spread of a mutated virus animal to human, catching the modern world with its pants down.”

“Highlights our changing values from community to “every man for himself”.

“Humans are being reminded, divine or not, that we are but specks in the universe.”

Maurice McGahey also agreed on the virus origins, posting his thoughts, but he stressed the theory had not been peer reviewed (reviewed by other scientists).

“Scientific evidence shows that this COVID-19 disease caused by the SARS-2 virus came from a live animal market (commonly know as a wet market) in Wuhan China,” he posted.

“The Swine Flu came from a similar market in Central America and Bird Flu came from similar markets in China.

“There is no doubting that.”

Then there were others who thought there was more to the pandemic than just a virus, like Leisa Fleming who posted “Or it's a way for government to do stuff while we all in lockdown

“Its hard to say as a lot of the tinfoil hat stuff is becoming true...who knows.”

Angie Bennett posed some questions, saying “I think agenda, possibly testing bio-... definitely more than what we are told.”

Kathy Robertson-Cipak said “Agenda 21,” which was a theory that governments around the world were colluding to manage the planet and population growth.

Robert Tryhorn had his own theory, but was open to being proved wrong, “I believe that this virus is genetically modified by people in a foreign land.”

“Until such time as science can offer definitive proof that this is not true.”

Until scientists complete a peer reviewed study that definitively proves the virus origins, there will always be conspiracy theories circulating.