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Pandemic: Beijing Reported COVID Cases

China reported COVID-19 cases including the Omicron mutant. Beijing reported an Omicron case on January 15. It also reported 5 COVID cases on January 19. The Beijing government spokesperson said the Omicron and Delta variants were cross spreading in Beijing and created a higher risk for COVID prevention. The Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is known for hiding COVID information, so the actual infection situation is unknown.

Beijing reported that two patients in Fangshan District (counted in the January 19 infection cases) had not left Beijing in the past 14 days. This made people wonder if they got the virus from other people in whom the infection had not yet been detected.

However, the CCP blamed the international mail and the international supply chain. The authorities said that the patient in the January 15 case received an international mail that had been sent from Canada on January 7, going through the United States and Hong Kong, and then arriving in Beijing on January 11. Chinese medical experts found the Omicron virus on that international mail.

Other Chinese cities also blamed international shipping for spreading the COVID virus. Shenzhen City, Guangdong Province said an Omicron patient in their city received an international mail on January 12. Zhuhai City, Guangdong Province said a COVID patient in their city worked in the international supply chain field.

However, experts outside of China questioned the possibility of the mail spreading COVID. Some argued that the virus trace on the mail could have been from the patient who might have already caught COVID by the time he received the mail. The Wall Street Journal also quoted a London doctor, Martin Hibberd, who stated that there is not much evidence to support the theory that COVID can spread over an object’s surface. The virus might only live for 10 minutes on the surface, but shipping can take several hours or even several days.”

Pandemic: Xuchang Police Accused a COVID Testing Company of Spreading the Virus

On January 12, the Xuchang Police in Henan Province published a short announcement. The police claimed that manager Zhang of the KingMed Diagnostics’ office in Zhengzhou City, Henan Province, “violated the provisions of the Prevention and Control of Infectious Diseases Act and committed acts that caused the spread of the (COVID-19) virus or which had a serious risk of causing such a spread.” The police started an investigation into the case.

In early January, Xuchang found COVID cases in its affiliated city Yuzhou and locked down Yuzhou. Last month, it became the second city in the province to be locked down after Xi’an.

KingMed Diagnostics is the largest medical lab testing COVID-19 in China. By November 2011, it had completed 220 million COVID tests, which was the highest number among all labs in the world. Zhong Nanshan, a communist regime endorsed COVID-19 expert doctor, who speaks for the government from time to time, created the company.

Since the police didn’t disclose what Zhang did, there were rumors on the Internet about what happened. One guess was that KingMed spread the virus and in the meantime collected money from the government for testing it. Another guess was that KingMed received many testing samples but couldn’t complete them in the required time-frame; then the manager reported the test results were ALL negative and discarded the samples that they didn’t have time to test. However, later the government found there were positives cases.

The next day, January 13, KingMed published a statement that the Zhengzhou KingMed office received the Xuchang City’s request to participate in the COVID testing. Zhang and five other people formed a supporting team and came to Yuzhou. They worked on the testing from January 2 to 9. The company’s statement also denied the rumors of “actively spreading the virus,” “faking test results,” and “hiding infection numbers.” The company said that it reserves the right to go after those who spread rumors.

Other postings on Chinascope:
Pandemic: Omicron Appeared in China and One More City Locked Down
Pandemic: COVID Spread to Henan and Zhejiang Province
Pandemic: Xi’an Locked Down

Sources:
1. BBC, January 13, 2022
https://www.bbc.com/zhongwen/simp/chinese-news-59976287
2. China News Agency Finance, January 13, 2022
http://www.jwview.com/jingwei/html/01-13/457207.shtml

Hot Topics | | January 16, 2022 | Social Stability

People’s Lives: Tragic Deaths in Xi’an

Since December 23, 2021, Xi’an City, Shaanxi Province has been locked down for 20 days due to the outbreak of the COVID-19 virus. Despite the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) fierce Internet monitoring and constantly deleting postings that did not follow the party’s main theme, some people in Xi’an still managed to post videos or texts to report on the tragedies due to the authorities’ inhumanity.

A video reported that a woman who was eight-months pregnant went to a hospital in Xi’an, but the hospital refused to treat her since her COVID test result (though negative) expired four hours earlier.

A netizen wrote,“My auntie sat on the chair, using her hands to support her body with great difficulty (as shown in a video).” “Blood flowed down the chair and her pants and the floor was covered with blood.” She was admitted for hospitalization two hours later. By then, the eight-month-old fetus had died.

Another lady who was six weeks pregnant reported a similar experience on January 5. She saw blood in her discharge and went to the hospital. Several hospitals refused to take her. Her husband called several public hospitals and they all rejected her. He called 120 (China’s emergency phone number which is like 911 in the United States) and received no answer either. She was finally accepted by a hospital six hours later, but it was too late. The hospital aborted the baby due to her heavy bleeding.

In another case, on December 31, 2021, a 39-year-old man suddenly had chest congestion. Since he had not had COVID test within the last 48 hours, 120 (China’s 911) refused to help him. He had no choice but to take the test. Even after he got a negative result, three hospitals still refused to take him. The fourth one took him, but it was too late. He died at the hospital.

Another citizen said that his mother needed to have a hemodialysis treatment three times a week, but people enforcing the lockdown wouldn’t let her go through, despite the fact that she showed her proof. However, if she didn’t take the hemodialysis treatment on time, her life could be in jeopardy. So she had no choice but to climb over the highway to go to the hospital for treatment.

The CCP intensified Internet control. On January 10, the CCP controlled media reported that the Xi’an police had processed 30 fake news cases on the Internet and detained 23 people. The authorities didn’t disclose what information those people posted.

Xi’an people also suffered from a severe lack of food. Many people posted on the Internet that the authorities didn’t deliver food to them after the lockdown. A netizen posted on January 9 that she received only one delivery of vegetables during the 20 days of lockdown, which included 2 potatoes, 2 onions, 1 cabbage, and 2 radishes. She asked, “What are we supposed to eat? Exept for the COVID test, we are not allowed to go out. Should we just die out of hunger at home?”

Her second post said, “Today our door was sealed off (we are not allowed to open it anymore). Last evening, I cooked a quarter pound of steak for my six-year-old son, my 61-year-old mother, and me. I took one bite, mother took two bites, and my son had the rest. I was so heartbroken. Both mother and I cried … In such a prosperous time, it is unbelievable that we can’t buy and eat food due to the pandemic.”

Another netizen posted some pictures, showing that the vegetables that other cities sent to Xi’an were left alone in one spot for four or five days. No authorities came to process them.

Subnational Infiltration: Using Western Countries’ Local Governments to Counter the State’s Policy

The Voice of America (VOA) published an article that discussed two research reports exploring the Chinese Communist Party’s (CCP’s) subnational infiltration of Western countries. According to the reports, in a systematic way, the CCP takes advantage of the pluralistic and decentralized nature of the Western political system to rope in and encourage local governments to confront and dismantle, at the sub-national level, their state’s negative policies toward China. The VOA called it “encircling the cities from rural areas,” a military strategy that the CCP used to win the civil war in China in the late 1940’s.

In the U.S., the CCP’s strategy is to bypass Washington and to target the governors, mayors, and non-governmental organizations directly. The purpose is to foster a positive connection between Beijing and the local officials or organizations.

The two reports refer to the “All Over the Map” strategy. This strategy addresses the Chinese Communist Party’s “subnational Interests in the United States” as reported by the Foundation for the Defense of Democracies (FDD) and the “Big fish in small ponds strategy,” which is China’s subnational diplomacy in Europe” as discussed in an article by the Mercator Institute for China Studies (MERICS).

The FDD report states that China has a long history of trying to influence local governments in the United States, including through events and forums that promote U.S.-China relations and friendship cities (or sister cities), Internet forums, governors’ forums, and other examples. Though at the national level, the U.S., holds a critical attitude toward Beijing, the National Governors Association expresses positive descriptions about Beijing.

The MERICS article pointed out that, within the five biggest member countries of the European Union – Germany, France, Italy, Spain, and Poland, local governments have established 146 partnerships with the CCP. In many situations, Beijing or its entities can sign investment or cooperation treaties with Europen cities or regions, which usually do not need the central government’s participation.

Source: VOA, December 7, 2021
https://www.voachinese.com/a/china-subnational-diplomacy-20211207/6343105.html

Hot Topics | | December 23, 2021 | Geo-Strategic Trend US-China Relations

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Subnational Infiltration: Using Western Countries’ Local Governments to Counter the State’s Policy

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