The unfortunate fact is that the only plausible consequence of a public acceptance (by government officials) of the lab-leak hypothesis, is that funding for research into viruses would get a lot more restrictive. Maybe not less funding, but it would go to far fewer labs, which have the highest levels of containment.
The profession which knows enough to settle this question, thus has a massive conflict of interest. We cannot expect bankers to say that the response to the GFC should be to break up banks. We cannot expect generals after a war to say that they screwed up. We cannot expect intelligence agencies to say that they should have less power and more oversight. Scientists are human, they want to keep their job and not have to move to another city to do it.
What is actually going to happen, is nothing, until and unless a second lab leak kills a lot of people.
The profession which knows enough to settle this question, thus has a massive conflict of interest. We cannot expect bankers to say that the response to the GFC should be to break up banks. We cannot expect generals after a war to say that they screwed up. We cannot expect intelligence agencies to say that they should have less power and more oversight. Scientists are human, they want to keep their job and not have to move to another city to do it.
What is actually going to happen, is nothing, until and unless a second lab leak kills a lot of people.