BEIJING — China reported one new case of coronavirus Tuesday and no deaths, marking three weeks since it recorded a COVID-19 fatality.
The National Health Commission said 395 people remained under treatment in the hospital, while 949 were under isolation and observation for suspected cases or after testing positive despite showing no symptoms.
The latest figures come as China strikes back against accusations from U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo and others that the pandemic may have originated in a lab in the central Chinese city of Wuhan where it was first detected late last year.
The World Health Organization has backed up China’s refutations and most experts believe the virus developed naturally among bats and was transmitted to humans via an intermediary animal, most likely the armadillo-like pangolin that is sold for human consumption in wet markets, including the one in Wuhan linked to the pandemic’s origin.
China has reported 4,633 deaths from the virus among 82,881 cases, but strict travel restrictions, testing, quarantining and case tracing policies appear to have stemmed the virus as warm weather arrives in much of the country.
Sure.
You do you, China. Just do you.
First, it’s legitimate to say that their case load is suspiciously low. But that being said, it’s pretty much the case that they’ve whacked this in China.
China has one standout asset. They are a totalitarian country. In New Jersey, the governor puts up signs on electronic highway messaging boards to the effect of “Don’t Be A Knucklehead.” This is a very NJ framing. In China, they take you into custody. For the most part, they don’t even bother with re-education camps (these would trend to spread disease, and it’s not like pro-democracy protests so they don’t feel a need to do dissident-smashing; they just want them off the streets. They also have a population that doesn’t mind. On top of all that, they have testing that works and could easily commandeer resources (ventilators, masks) and were very creative about finding space. Oh yes, being a totalitarian country, they re-opened the Stalin era manual of civilian travel controls and proceeded to isolate Wuhan province.
Of course, South Korea also knocked it down as did Taiwan. Europe is more disorderly (I’m excluding Britain which is no longer part of Europe) but if Italy can do it, the pandemic can be dealt with.
The United States is now officially off the global leadership list. We’d be the laughing stock of the world except that the death rate is no laughing matter. All we’ve got going for us are nuclear weapons and more aircraft carriers than the rest of the world combined. Sad to report that Sidewinder missiles are not effective cures for Covid-19.
China has controlled this disease enough that they are not afraid to re- open.
And they did this with no notice whatsoever from anybody that this pandemic was coming.
So far no more digging of mass graves has been seen.
The information you are relying on about China comes from Trump.
I rest my case.