The New York Times used to be a respected newspaper, but over the last few decades it’s been sliding downhill, particularly rapidly in the last few years.

Its science reporting especially used to be top notch.

No more.

A case in point is its recent article alleging that the SARS-CoV-2 virus was hatched in a laboratory.

Sadly this has become the norm for them ever since the pandemic, as their reporting on all things involving that virus has been uneven to say the least.

Rather than eviscerate that article myself, I’ll link to the recent This Week in Virology episode where they go over the article point by point using good science. They are much more polite than I would be.

TWiV Special: How the pandemic began in Nature, in 5 key points

Watch it on YouTube or listen on your podcast app. Oh, and this special edition is the streamlined version where they cut out all the banter and only left in the science stuff. The full episode can be found here.