[News] Growing Xenophobia Against China in the Midst of CoronaShock

[Anti-Imperialist News]

https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/03/31/growing-xenophobia-against-china-in-the-midst-of-coronashock/
Growing
Xenophobia Against China in the Midst of CoronaShock
by Vijay Prashad, Du Xiaojun – Weiyan Zhu
<https://www.counterpunch.org/author/vjprddxjw9949/> - March 31, 2020
------------------------------

Photograph Source: susanjanegolding – CC BY 2.0
<https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/2.0/>

On March 25, the foreign ministers of the G7 states failed to release a
statement. The United States—the president of the G7 at this time—had the
responsibility for drafting the statement, which was seen to be
unacceptable by several other members. In the draft
<https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/25/politics/g7-coronavirus-statement/index.html>,
the United States used the phrase “Wuhan Virus” and asserted that the
global pandemic was the responsibility of the Chinese government. Earlier,
U.S. President Donald Trump had used
<https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/18/us/politics/china-virus.html> the
phrase “Chinese Virus” (which he said he would stop using) and a member of
his staff was reportedly heard
<https://twitter.com/weijia/status/1239923246801334283> using the slur
“Kung Flu.” On Fox News, anchor Jesse Watters explained
<https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yv8ddtv42IE&feature=youtu.be> in his
unfiltered racist way “why [the virus] started in China. Because they have
these markets where they eat raw bats and snakes.” Violent attacks against
Asians in the United States has spiked
<https://docs.google.com/document/d/1TRU-ZJcjPQj7EoAnjxGbHo7CTnoOnGXHhjk5VDuKnyQ/view>
as a consequence of the stigma driven by the Trump administration.

Quite correctly, the World Health Organization’s Director-General Tedros
Adhanom Ghebreyesus called for “solidarity, not stigma” in a speech
<https://www.who.int/dg/speeches/detail/who-director-general-s-remarks-at-the-media-briefing-on-COVID-2019-outbreak-on-14-february-2020>
given on February 14, long before the virus had hit Europe or North
America. Ghebreyesus knew that there would be a temptation to blame China
for the virus, in fact, to use the virus as a weapon to attack China in the
most repulsive way. His slogan —solidarity, not stigma—was intended to
sharply demarcate an internationalist and humanist response to the global
pandemic from a narrow bigoted and unscientific response to the virus.

*Origins*

SARS-CoV-2, which is the official name for the virus, developed in the way
many viruses develop: through the transmission between animals and humans.
There is as yet no firm consensus about where this virus developed; one
suggestion is that it developed in the west end of the Hunan Wholesale Sea
Food Market in Wuhan, in China’s Hubei province, where wild animals are
sold. A central issue is the expansion
<https://monthlyreview.org/2020/03/27/covid-19-and-circuits-of-capital/> of
agriculture into forests and hinterlands, where humans have a greater
chance to interact with new pathogens, such as SARS-CoV-2. But this is not
the only such virus, even though it is undoubtedly the most dangerous to
humans. In the recent period, we have seen a range of panzootic avian flu
such as H1N1, H5Nx, H5N2 and H5N6. Even though H5N2 was known to have
originated in the United States, it was not known as the “American virus”
and no-one sought to stigmatize the United States for it. The scientific
name was used to describe these viruses, which are not the responsibility
of this or that nation; the arrival of these viruses raises the more
fundamental question of human encroachment into forests and the balance
between human civilization (agriculture and cities) and the wilds.

The naming of a virus is a controversial matter. In 1832, cholera advanced
from British India toward Europe. It was called “Asiatic Cholera.” The
French felt that since they were democratic, they would not succumb to a
disease of authoritarianism; France was ravaged by cholera, which was as
much about the bacteria as it is about the state of hygiene inside Europe
and North America. (When cholera struck the United States in 1848, the
Public Bathing Movement was born.)

The “Spanish Flu” was only named after Spain because it came during World
War I when journalism in most belligerent countries was censored. The media
in Spain, not being in the war, widely reported the flu, and so that
pandemic took the name of the country. In fact, evidence showed that the
Spanish Flu began in the United States, in a military base in Kansas where
the chickens transmitted the virus to soldiers. It would then travel to
British India, where 60 percent of the casualties of that pandemic took
place. It was never named the “American Flu” and no Indian government has
ever sought to recover costs from the United States because of the
animal-to-human transmission that happened there.

*China and the Coronavirus*

In an important article
<https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(20)30183-5/fulltext>
published in the medical journal The Lancet, Professor Chaolin Huang wrote,
“The symptom onset date of the first patient [of SARS-CoV-2] identified was
December 1, 2019.” Initially, there was widespread confusion about the
nature of the virus, and whether it could be transmitted from human to
human. It was assumed that the virus was one of the known viruses and that
it was mainly transmitted from animals to humans.

Dr. Zhang Jixian, director of the Department of Respiratory and Critical
Care Medicine of Hubei Province Hospital of Integrated Chinese and Western
Medicine, was one of the first doctors to sound the alarm about the novel
coronavirus pneumonia outbreak. On December 26, Dr. Zhang saw an elderly
couple who had high fever and a cough—symptoms that characterize the flu.
Further examination ruled out influenza A and B, mycoplasma, chlamydia,
adenovirus and SARS. A CT scan of their son showed that something had
partially filled the interior of his lungs. That same day, another
patient—a seller from the seafood market—presented the same symptoms. Dr.
Zhang reported the four patients to China’s Center for Disease Control and
Prevention of the Jianghan District of Wuhan. Over the next two days, Dr.
Zhang and her colleagues saw three more patients with the same symptoms who
had visited the seafood market. On December 29, the Hubei Provincial Center
for Disease Control and Prevention sent
<https://news.sina.cn/gn/2020-02-02/detail-iimxyqvy9611122.d.html?vt=4&sid=256278>
experts to investigate the seven patients at the hospital. On February 6,
Hubei Province recognized
<http://www.xinhuanet.com/politics/2020-02/06/c_1125540130.htm> the
valuable work done by Dr. Zhang and her team in the fight to identify and
reveal the virus. There was no attempt to suppress her work.

Two other doctors—Dr. Li Wenliang (an ophthalmologist from Wuhan Central
Hospital) and Ai Fen (chief of the department of emergency treatment at
Wuhan Central Hospital)—played a significant role in trying to break
through the confusion to bring clarity toward the new virus. In the first
days, when everything seemed fuzzy, they were reprimanded by the
authorities for spreading fake news. Dr. Li died of the coronavirus on
February 7. Major medical and government institutions—the National Health
Commission
<http://www.nhc.gov.cn/xcs/s3574/202002/680b01ada7604820a155dd7e9fd89ba6.shtml>,
the Health Commission of Hubei Province
<http://wjw.hubei.gov.cn/fbjd/dtyw/202002/t20200207_2020688.shtml>, the Chinese
Medical Doctor Association <http://www.cmda.net/jrtt/13481.jhtml> and the
Wuhan government
<http://www.wh.gov.cn/hbgovinfo/zwgk_8265/tzgg/202002/t20200207_304499.html>
—expressed their public condolences to his family. On March 19, the Wuhan
Public Security Bureau admitted
<https://news.china.com/socialgd/10000169/20200320/37946105_all.html> that
it inappropriately reprimanded Dr. Li, and it chastised its officers. Dr.
Ai Fen was also told to stop spreading fake news, but in February she
received an apology and was later felicitated
<http://www.chinanews.com/gn/2020/02-20/9098298.shtml> by Wuhan
Broadcasting and Television Station.

The provincial authorities knew about the new virus by December 29. The
next day, they informed China’s Center for Disease Control, and the
following day, on December 31, China informed the World Health Organization
(WHO), a month after the first mysterious infection was reported in Wuhan.
The virus was identified by January 3; a week later, China shared the
genetic sequence of the new coronavirus with WHO. It is because China
released the DNA that immediate scientific work took place across the
planet to find a vaccine; there are now 43 vaccine candidates, four in very
early testing.

China’s National Health Commission assembled
<http://news.cctv.com/2020/01/20/ARTIpp9O9wIAhOmowTydRmT0200120.shtml> a
team of experts from the Chinese Center for Disease Control and Prevention,
the Chinese Academy of Medical Sciences, and the Chinese Academy of
Sciences; they conducted a series of experiments on the virus samples. On
January 8, they confirmed that the novel coronavirus was indeed the source
of the outbreak. The first death from the virus was reported on 11 January.
On January 14, the Wuhan Municipal Health Commission said
<http://wjw.wuhan.gov.cn/front/web/showDetail/2020011409039> that there was
still no evidence of human-to-human transmission, but they could not say
with certainty that limited human-to-human transmission was impossible.

A week later, on January 20, Dr. Zhong Nanshan said
<https://news.sina.com.cn/c/2020-01-21/doc-iihnzahk5456866.shtml> that the
novel coronavirus could be spread from human to human (Dr. Zhong, a member
of the Communist Party of China, is a famous respiratory expert and a
leading person in the fight against SARS in China). Some medical workers
were infected by the virus. That day Chinese President Xi Jinping and
Premier Li Keqiang instructed
<http://www.xinhuanet.com/mrdx/2020-01/21/c_138722783.htm> all levels of
government to pay attention to the spread of the virus; the National Health
Commission and other official bodies were told to begin emergency response
measures. Wuhan went
<http://www.hb.xinhuanet.com/2020-01/23/c_1125496006.htm> into full
lockdown on January 23, three days after human-to-human transmission of
this virus was established. The next day, Hubei province activated
<http://www.hubei.gov.cn/zhuanti/2020/gzxxgzbd/zxtb/202001/t20200124_2014659.shtml>
its Level-1 alert. On January 25, Premier Li assembled a coordinating
group. He visited <http://news.youth.cn/sz/202001/t20200127_12178609.htm>
Wuhan two days later.

It is unclear if China could have done anything different as it faced an
unknown virus. A WHO team that visited China from February 16 to 24 praised
the government and the Chinese people in its report
<https://www.who.int/docs/default-source/coronaviruse/who-china-joint-mission-on-covid-19-final-report.pdf>
for doing their utmost to stem the spread of the virus; thousands of
doctors and medical personnel arrived in Wuhan, two new hospitals were
built for those infected by the virus, and various civic bodies went into
action to assist families under lockdown. What the Chinese authorities did
to stem the rise of the infections—as a major new study
<https://www.medrxiv.org/content/10.1101/2020.03.03.20030593v1.full.pdf>shows—was
to put those infected in hospitals and those who had been in touch with
them into quarantine. This targeted policy was able to identify those who
had been in the chain of infection and thereby break the chain.

*The World and China*

The Indian state of Kerala’s Health Minister K. K. Shailaja followed
<https://peoplesdispatch.org/2020/03/24/an-often-overlooked-region-of-india-is-a-beacon-to-the-world-for-taking-on-the-coronavirus/>
the rise of the cases in Wuhan and began emergency measures in this state
of 35 million people in India. She did not wait. What China was doing
taught Shailaja and her team how to respond. They were able to contain the
virus in this part of India.

The United States was informed about the severity of the problem early. On
New Year’s Day, the Chinese Center for Disease Control officials called Dr.
Robert Redfield, head of the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and
Prevention, while he was on vacation. “What he heard rattled him,” wrote
<https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/28/us/testing-coronavirus-pandemic.html>
the New York Times. Dr. George F. Gao, the head of the Chinese CDC, spoke
to Redfield days later, and Dr. Gao “burst into tears” during the
conversation. This warning was not taken seriously. A month later, on
January 30, U.S. President Donald Trump took a very cavalier position. “We
think it’s going to have a good ending for us,” he said
<https://www.wsj.com/articles/coronavirus-triggers-damage-control-from-governments-companies-11580396657>
of the coronavirus. “That I can assure you.” He did not declare a national
emergency till March 13, by which time the virus had begun to spread in the
United States.

Others around the world were as cavalier. They were like the French
politicians of 1832 who felt that France would not be affected by “Asiatic
cholera.” There was no such thing as Asiatic cholera in 1832, but only
cholera that would harm people with poor hygienic systems. In the same way,
there is no such thing as a Chinese virus; there is only the SARS-CoV-2.
The Chinese people showed us the way to confront this virus, but only after
some trial and error on their part. It is time to learn that lesson now. As
the WHO says
<https://www.who.int/dg/speeches/detail/who-director-general-s-opening-remarks-at-the-media-briefing-on-covid-19---16-march-2020>,
“test, test, test,” and then carefully calibrate lockdowns, isolations, and
quarantine. Chinese doctors who developed expertise in fighting the virus
are now in Iran, Italy, and elsewhere, bringing the spirit of
internationalism and collaboration with them.

On March 4, Dr. Bruce Aylward, who led the WHO team to China, was
interviewed by the New York Times. When asked about the Chinese response to
the virus, he said
<https://www.nytimes.com/2020/03/04/health/coronavirus-china-aylward.html>,
“They’re mobilized, like in a war, and it’s fear of the virus that was
driving them. They really saw themselves on the frontlines of protecting
the rest of China. And of the world.”

*Vijay Prashad is an Indian historian, editor and journalist. He is a
writing fellow and chief correspondent at Globetrotter
<https://independentmediainstitute.org/globetrotter/>, a project of the
Independent Media Institute. He is the chief editor of LeftWord Books
<https://tinyurl.com/y976jlvu> and the director of Tricontinental:
Institute for Social Research <http://thetricontinental.org/>. He has
written more than twenty books, including The Darker Nations: A People’s
History of the Third World
<https://smile.amazon.com/Darker-Nations-Peoples-History-Third/dp/1595583424/?tag=alternorg08-20>
(The New Press, 2007), The Poorer Nations: A Possible History of the Global
South
<https://smile.amazon.com/Poorer-Nations-Possible-History-Global/dp/1781681589/?tag=alternorg08-20>
(Verso, 2013), The Death of the Nation and the Future of the Arab
Revolution
<https://smile.amazon.com/Death-Nation-Future-Arab-Revolution/dp/0520293266/?tag=alternorg08-20>
(University of California Press, 2016) and Red Star Over the Third World
<https://smile.amazon.com/Red-Star-Over-Third-World-ebook/dp/B0799NP7DD/?tag=alternorg08-20>
(LeftWord, 2017).*

*Du Xiaojun works as a translator and is based in Shanghai. His research is
in international relations, cross-cultural communication, and applied
linguistics.*

*Weiyan Zhu is a lawyer based in Beijing. She is interested in social and
political issues.*
-------------- next part --------------
An HTML attachment was scrubbed...
URL: <http://freedomarchives.org/pipermail/news_freedomarchives.org/attachments/20200331/336be038/attachment.htm>