This is as well my strongly held belief, and the most likely cause.

And people making the really odd responses below. They're, not saying it, but insinuating that the lab would be where there is lots of bat coronavirus? The lab is in the city of Wuhan. A city with a population of 11 million people. This isn't some rural town.

There was a lab that studied this type of coronavirus, had published papers on it. And in a country the size of the USA had an outbreak within just a few miles from that lab. Then the govt came and refused to let anyone outside investigate.

To me that leads pretty strongly that it was an accidental lab leak. And they weren't able to control the spread.

My hopeful opinion is that this leads to more stringent worldwide rules for reporting leaks, and checking of safety practices to avoid this happening again

> My hopeful opinion is that this leads to more stringent worldwide rules for reporting leaks, and checking of safety practices to avoid this happening again

A leak that results in 2.7 million worldwide deaths will not result in "more stringent worldwide rules for reporting leaks". It would result in economic reparations and possibly war.

Leak or not, it's in China's interest to prevent the blame from falling on them. The narrative here is an incredibly powerful geopolitical tool.

It's even more in China's interest to not have more such leaks, or to have other countries have similar leaks.

Their manufacturing economy does not benefit from being locked down on a regular basis