I agree that the knowledge about what exactly happened in these cases won't change much. But your pessimism about solutions here seems totally off base and not backed up by any evidence, except in the case of sub-Saharan Africa. China can (and has) substantially limit wet markets. Rules about gain of function research are hotly debated because they make a real difference in what science is done, and what science is funded. Lab Bio-safety levels make a real difference in how research is conducted, what research is conducted, and how likely leaks are. Researchers in China are much more connected to global scientific networks and likely to follow proposed protocols than you suggest (research at the WIV was funded by the NIH!).
What I suppose is on my mind about labs here is simply this: if the Chinese state feels it has reason to impede investigations or limit scrutiny of labs in China, that's the real problem, and it's not just a problem with China but with anything that limits such scrutiny, whether it's corporate secrets or sovereign ones. But those are problems which are substantially off-limits within conventional frameworks for making international policy.
If the major risk from labs was that they were doing something that the Chinese state wanted to do but we wanted them not to do, then issue you raise would be a big problem. For example, if the US decided that Gain of Function research is bad, but Chinese scientists did it anyway because they thought it was good, we definitely have limited leverage to force them to stop. Or if the Chinese military was developing biological weapons, they're not going to let in inspectors to check.
But the relevant issues are not really like that. Lab leaks are primarily accidents that everyone wants to avoid, current virus research is done mostly for international academic prestige and with international collaboration and funding, the Chinese state definitely wants to avoid accidental pandemics.
Obviously limiting international scrutiny means that we learn somewhat less about how to avoid these mistakes on both sides. But that's a pretty limited degree, and a significant majority of the relevant labs are in the "West" so trying to do something about them has a lot of impact on the problem even if the Chinese don't care at all (which I think is very unlikely).
I agree that the knowledge about what exactly happened in these cases won't change much. But your pessimism about solutions here seems totally off base and not backed up by any evidence, except in the case of sub-Saharan Africa. China can (and has) substantially limit wet markets. Rules about gain of function research are hotly debated because they make a real difference in what science is done, and what science is funded. Lab Bio-safety levels make a real difference in how research is conducted, what research is conducted, and how likely leaks are. Researchers in China are much more connected to global scientific networks and likely to follow proposed protocols than you suggest (research at the WIV was funded by the NIH!).
What I suppose is on my mind about labs here is simply this: if the Chinese state feels it has reason to impede investigations or limit scrutiny of labs in China, that's the real problem, and it's not just a problem with China but with anything that limits such scrutiny, whether it's corporate secrets or sovereign ones. But those are problems which are substantially off-limits within conventional frameworks for making international policy.
If the major risk from labs was that they were doing something that the Chinese state wanted to do but we wanted them not to do, then issue you raise would be a big problem. For example, if the US decided that Gain of Function research is bad, but Chinese scientists did it anyway because they thought it was good, we definitely have limited leverage to force them to stop. Or if the Chinese military was developing biological weapons, they're not going to let in inspectors to check.
But the relevant issues are not really like that. Lab leaks are primarily accidents that everyone wants to avoid, current virus research is done mostly for international academic prestige and with international collaboration and funding, the Chinese state definitely wants to avoid accidental pandemics.
Obviously limiting international scrutiny means that we learn somewhat less about how to avoid these mistakes on both sides. But that's a pretty limited degree, and a significant majority of the relevant labs are in the "West" so trying to do something about them has a lot of impact on the problem even if the Chinese don't care at all (which I think is very unlikely).