Chinascope – Page 354

Virus Origin: Who Was Patient “No. Zero”?

Many people, including medical experts, have been questioning the origin of the coronavirus. Many Chinese individually questioned whether it was created by the Wuhan National Biosafety Laboratory, China’s first Biocontainment Level 4 (BL4) lab (Chinese call it a P4 lab) in Wuhan.

There have been widespread discussions among Chinese individuals on the Internet about a few “theories” to support this suspicion, though officially the media have remained silent:

The virus was leaked to the public by selling experimental animals with the coronavirus.
Huang Yanling (黄燕玲), a female graduate student who studied at the P4 lab in 2012, was the first coronavirus patient (Patient “No. Zero”).
No one from the P4 lab has caught the coronavirus, so they may know a specific way to protect themselves.

On February 15, the government declared theory #2 to be a “rumor.” The Wuhan Institute of Virology, the Chinese Academy of Sciences, issued a statement that Huang Yanling didn’t work at Wuhan P4 lab after her graduation.

Beijing News interviewed Shi Zhengli, the lead technician at the P4 lab and Chen Quanjiao, a researcher at the lab. Both were not sure if the lab has someone called Huang Yanling, but Shi Zhengli flatly rejected the idea that patient “No. Zero” was from the lab. “How could that be? It is definitely fake news. I can guarantee that including graduate students, no one in our institute has been infected. Our institute has zero infections.”

Caixin also gave a detailed report on patient “No. Zero.” In addition to mentioning that it was a rumor, it explained the significance of identifying patient “No. Zero” and mentioned that the first reported infection case of coronavirus was on December 1, 2019 and the patient didn’t go to the seafood market, which China blamed as the starting point of the virus.

Leadership: Xi Explains His Role in Containing Coronavirus since January 7

Qiushi Journal, the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) Central Committee’s flagship bimonthly periodical, released a speech that Xi Jinping, the CCP General Secretary, gave at the February 3 meeting of the Politburo Standing Committee.

Qiushi published the full text of Xi’s speech on Saturday, February 15. In the speech, Xi explained his role since January 7, 2020, in containing the novel coronavirus. After consolidating power, Xi has made it a rule that different organizations, including the National People’s Congress, State Council, each headed by a Politburo Standing Committee member, all report their work to him. This is the first time he had to explain to others what he has been doing.

China experts observed that Xi has been under mounting domestic and international pressure because of the outbreak, as well as the spread of the coronavirus. In order to “gain international understanding and support,” Xi offered guidance on “communicating with WHO, and with relevant countries and regions, to promote information sharing and policy coordination.” Meanwhile, Wilbur Ross, the US commerce secretary, revealed that the 15-member WHO delegation has no US experts in it.

Xi also wanted to “ensure societal control and security by stepping up law enforcement and mobilizing public security and the armed police in joint efforts.” Xi made no mention of the delayed or inaccurate reporting that the local leaders from Wuhan, the epicenter of the virus outbreak had voiced.

Xi gave orders to “strengthen control and management of Internet media; push for clear organizational and individual obligations, management obligations, and supervision obligations; and strike against and handle those who spread rumors and stir up trouble.”

On February 4, the day after Xi’s speech, Zhao Kezhi, minister of China’s ministry of public security, told police personnel across the country through a teleconference to maintain a secure and stable environment to fight the virus. He said the police needed to place “political security” above everything else, and to crack down on “domestic and international hostile forces.”

Xi also emphasized adherence to the economic goals set for this year, including achieving “moderate prosperity.”

Resuming Production: Companies Discover Coronavirus Cases after Resuming Work – February 16

After Xi Jinping pushed for thawing the economic freeze due to the lockdown of cities in the face of the novel coronavirus, a few places in China mobilized businesses to resume work. However, several companies, after restarting work, immediately reported a patient of coronavirus at work and thus had to stop operations and instead quarantine all or part of the employees who came to work for another 14 days.

An office worker from Guangzhou was found to have caught the coronavirus. All employees from his company were stopped from working and put under quarantine.
A person returned to Beijing to resume his work after the Chinese New Year. After working for eight days, he was found to have the coronavirus. Several dozen people in his department were quarantined and a colleague who sat next to him at the cafeteria during lunch was infected.
A branch of Chongqing Titanium Industry Company, owned by the Panzhihua Iron and Steel Company, a State-owned enterprise and the largest steel maker in Western China, had 2 confirmed cases and 1 asymptomatic infection case, with 131 people having had close contact with the patients.
Lianyuan Conch Cement Factory in Loudi City, Hunan Province and an electricity power plant in Shanxi Province also reported cases. The companies either stopped operations or locked down the employees.
Gree Electric in Zhuhai City, Hubei Province reported that a driver of a shuttle bus to transport its employees to work had close contact with a confirmed coronavirus patient. Gree has several tens of thousands of employees in Zhuhai.

Locust Plague, the Next Disaster to Hit China?

The desert locust (scientific name “Schistocerca gregaria”), the type of locust that is most destructive to human beings, has been spreading in Africa, the Middle East, India, and Pakistan. The Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations has warned about a possible food crises in countries that they have invaded.

Two of China’s neighboring countries, Pakistan and India, are suffering from its attacks. Pakistan has entered a state of emergency; its government expressed that the country will end up with no harvest at all this year if it doesn’t get the pest under control. Some Indian scholars predicted the locust plague will cause a 30 to 50 percent reduction in India’s food growth this year.

Kang Le, an Ecologist and Entomologist, and an Academician at the Chinese Academy of Sciences, told China Science News, during his interview with the newspaper, that the desert locusts will not impact China.

Kang said, “The current Locust plague is caused by the Schistocerca gregaria type. Its distribution region does not include China. Some scientists reported that the Schistocerca gregaria type was discovered in Yunnan Province in the early 1900’s but that claim was not confirmed. Therefore, Schistocerca gregaria will not create a severe threat to China.”

Kang also said that China has had a good experience in treating types of migratory locusts in China. However, that experience cannot easily be applied to the desert locust. “Since the desert locust has different characteristics and lives in a different environment from China’s types of locusts, it is not practical to apply China’s experience to the desert locust directly.”

On the other hand, Twitter has posted that the desert locusts have already arrived in Xinjiang.

Sources:
1. 163.com, February 15, 2020
https://news.163.com/20/0215/16/F5EJFM1M0001899O.html
2. Twitter

蝗虫已经到新疆，中国网友还一顿猛猜测蝗虫翻阅不了大山。。。。 pic.twitter.com/qkAJwrqRzq

— 武汉普通人 (@Onebtcer) February 15, 2020

Briefings | | February 16, 2020 | Economy/Resources Social Stability

Chinese Foreign Minister: The United States is Threatening China

On February 14, 2020, in an interview with Reuters in Berlin, Wang Yi, China’s Foreign Minister since March 2013 and State Councilor since March 2018, responded to a questions about whether China poses a threat to the United States. Wang stated that the U.S. is actually threatening other countries.

Xinhua reported Wang’s remarks as follows:

“Wang Yi said that China is willing to follow the five principles of peaceful coexistence with the United States and establish and develop long-term stable friendly cooperative relations. This is China’s established policy, but the United States, on the contrary, is constantly putting pressure on China and frequently blaming and discrediting China. The facts are very clear as to who is threatening whom. For example, the National People’s Congress of China has never passed any resolution involving the domestic affairs of the United States. Nevertheless, the U.S. Congress has reviewed and passed, one after another, a number of resolutions that grossly interfere with China’s domestic affairs. Chinese warships and aircraft have never shown their strength around the United States. It is precisely the United States that has continuously dispatched warships and aircraft to China’s gate to show off its strength. China has never sanctioned any U.S. company and always welcomes U.S. companies to invest in China. It provides them with a good business environment, but the United States has done everything possible to impose so-called unilateral sanctions and long-arm jurisdiction on Chinese companies to restrict China’s rights to develop and grow. Therefore, when it comes to threats, it is not China that threatens the United States. It is exactly that the United States is threatening China. The problem to be solved is also how to eliminate this threat from the United States.

Source: Xinhua, February 15, 2020
http://www.xinhuanet.com/2020-02/15/c_1125578363.htm

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