catinstalbans
Well-known member
Well, half term is nearly over-lessons to prepare later and I said I would respond to some false accusations made by a certain poster. So here goes.
First a summary. I learnt only one bit of new information by watching the documentary which I was told would prove beyond doubt China's guilt and responsibility for every single death the world has suffered, how they covered it up for months and conned the WHO. None of which turned out to be true. Indeed there was no contradiction at all of the WHO timeline which I have already posted twice but which for unknown reasons is not accepted by conspiracy theorists and right wing defenders of the inadequate and negligent response to the virus by both the UK Conservative government and Trump's administration in the US.
So here are my objective notes made in chronological order as the programme proceeded. Comments are made in brackets.
The first comment in the preamble is a quote from Boris Johnson that "the country will get through coronavirus in good shape" (I know the willingness of some to accept no blame on their blonde idol but even the most starstruck supporter must acknowledge that with 120,000 deaths this statement has turned out to be just as false as Boris' many deliberate lies.)
Then we go to the timeline of the epidemic. The first indication of an issue are social media posts on December 31 coming from doctors in Wuhan about a SARS like infection. (This matches exactly the WHO timeline, but does not mention that the response to the WHO came from the local health commission in Wuhan. Of course the illness probably started to appear a few days earlier -we now know that it can take 7-10 day from infection and a further 7-10 days for symptoms to worsen to a point where medical support is required)
The questions immediately raised were 1) to what degree was it causing severe disease and 2) how transmissible was the infection? From a historical context the original SARS outbreak 20 years earlier had led to criticism of China by the WHO for its lack of information given to international agencies at this time. (It was a concern that the pattern should not be repeated)
A cluster of cases were linked to a Wuhan wet market and this was closed by authorities in early January. There was a meeting of hospital staff at the beginning of January where staff were told not to pass information about the infection on social media. (This seems to me to be the essence of claims of a cover up but let's be realistic-should social media be the vector for reporting medical information or recognised channels and procedures on infections through the medical agencies. Also is it any different to our own NHS trusts warning staff not to discuss the situation on PPE equipment which occured later in the UK. At any length this was quickly rescinded as National authorities took over control.
Yi Chun Lo - a spokesperson for the Taiwan CDC was trying to make contact with Wuhan to arrange a visit by Taiwanese disease control to Wuhan to assess the situation for themselves. He described the initial management of the outbreak as shambolic. On the 5 January the Chinese statement via the WHO was that there was no evidence of human to human transmission but that it could not be ruled out. The visit occured in mid January and in a meeting between the Taiwanese delegation on the 20 January human to human transmission was "reluctantly" admitted. According to the programme this was the cover up.
( It probably was true that the response to the initial infection was chaotic, after all it was a completely new virus, pictures from a hospital in Wuhan was very similar to pictures from Italy during their crisis in February and also to film of patients clustered on trollies from previous winters in the austerity starved NHS in Britain.)
(I have to point out that the WHO stated that human to human transmission was possible on 14 January-one week earlier than the programme stated and would seem to negate the Taiwanese claims of a cover up towards them)
23 January- China locks down Wuhan and the neighbouring province. (I will return to this later in response to comments by Desman Pilley made later in the programme.)
30 January-first case in the UK
UK scientists develop a test for Covid 19 based on the genetic sequence openly published by China on 12 January ( Note less than two weeks after the initial reports of a new infection.)
The virus spread initially with a few cases in South East Asia but then took hold in Italy. Quarantine was introduced in Northern Italy on 23 February ( the week after half term in the UK and thousands returning from skiing holidays in the region.
One Italian town Vo managed to control the infection by extensive testing of the population following the first Covid death in Italy followed by quarantining of positive cases. Based on this extensive testing Andrea Crisanti a microbiologist reported evidence of asymptomatic transmission of Covid 19. The British government was informed but did not respond (they certainly ignored the advice)
On the 3 March the UK was confident that they could test their way through coronavirus. On the 12 March the UK abandoned attempts to track positive cases. 25,000 patients were discharged into care homes without testing.
23 March-the UK was the last major European nation to lockdown.
2 April guidance stated that there was no requirement to test for Covid before care homes admitted patients. ( Of all the negligent and complacent responses to Covid in the UK this to me stands out as one of the most culpable)
In care homes relatives described no PPE being used and mixing between isolation and non isolation staff.
In China the 76 day lockdown in Wuhan.
A couple of comments from leading scientists are worth noting here
Paul Nurse stated that China was ruthless in containing Covid 19 and as a result does not question the published number of deaths.It also meant that they were (In other comments not made in the programme he has stated that with modern travel pandemics are bound to spread around the world remarkably quickly and that preventing such spread is next to impossible. I have no doubt however that 20s will believe that he is right and that the Nobel prize winning geneticist does not know what he is talking about. He also described trying to advise the government as poking blancmange.)
Now I'm going to own up to a mistake in my note taking here. I am not sure if the next quote came from Paul Nurse or Deenan Pilley but as both are eminently more qualified to comment than myself I will still include it.
China was ruthless in enforcing testing, tracing and quarantine. As a result, fewer people died and they were also able to open up their economy more readily.
Deenan Pilley stated that China published the genetic sequence to the world within two weeks of the virus being identified. This collaboration allowed diagnostic testing and vaccine development to occur so rapidly across the world. This should be applauded. (This statement is so obvious that even the most devout China hater would agree-surely!)
Boris Johnson "we will have a world beating test, track and trace in place by June 1." (Remind me again, at what point did our privatised system actually prove effective in preventing a rise in infections? Certainly not by November or December. As lock down brings down infection rates then Serco has a third chance to get it right as the country opens up again from March. Let's hope that this time it works.)
As infection rates fell following the first lockdown the government introduced its eat out to help out the virus scheme and without a working test,track and trace system sent everybody back to work (threatening job losses), back to schools and universities. This allowed the virus to spread through the young and working population and then a couple of weeks later the virus takes hold in older patients causing the devastating second wave. It is all so predictable.(and damning)
So and this is definitely my opinion and comment to 20s. The programme did not prove that China covered up for months. The programme actually confirmed the WHO timeline that you have dismissed on two occasions now. At most the delay was a couple of weeks. Now this can be criticised but as a scientist with a biochemistry degree, two weeks to confirm genetic sequencing, transmission between humans does not seem unreasonable. You could make a valid argument that the precautionary principle should have made the decisive action China took occur sooner, but to quote the often used defence of Conservatives on here, it was about balancing the risk with the potential damage to the economy. Once the risk was clear the response was determined and effective. I doubt that any other nation on the planet would have responded differently. Indeed the response of most countries in the world was slower than China, even once the effects of the virus were becoming widely known.
Praise should go to those countries that did act swiftly to contain the virus, New Zealand, Vietnam and Taiwan being the best examples.
First a summary. I learnt only one bit of new information by watching the documentary which I was told would prove beyond doubt China's guilt and responsibility for every single death the world has suffered, how they covered it up for months and conned the WHO. None of which turned out to be true. Indeed there was no contradiction at all of the WHO timeline which I have already posted twice but which for unknown reasons is not accepted by conspiracy theorists and right wing defenders of the inadequate and negligent response to the virus by both the UK Conservative government and Trump's administration in the US.
So here are my objective notes made in chronological order as the programme proceeded. Comments are made in brackets.
The first comment in the preamble is a quote from Boris Johnson that "the country will get through coronavirus in good shape" (I know the willingness of some to accept no blame on their blonde idol but even the most starstruck supporter must acknowledge that with 120,000 deaths this statement has turned out to be just as false as Boris' many deliberate lies.)
Then we go to the timeline of the epidemic. The first indication of an issue are social media posts on December 31 coming from doctors in Wuhan about a SARS like infection. (This matches exactly the WHO timeline, but does not mention that the response to the WHO came from the local health commission in Wuhan. Of course the illness probably started to appear a few days earlier -we now know that it can take 7-10 day from infection and a further 7-10 days for symptoms to worsen to a point where medical support is required)
The questions immediately raised were 1) to what degree was it causing severe disease and 2) how transmissible was the infection? From a historical context the original SARS outbreak 20 years earlier had led to criticism of China by the WHO for its lack of information given to international agencies at this time. (It was a concern that the pattern should not be repeated)
A cluster of cases were linked to a Wuhan wet market and this was closed by authorities in early January. There was a meeting of hospital staff at the beginning of January where staff were told not to pass information about the infection on social media. (This seems to me to be the essence of claims of a cover up but let's be realistic-should social media be the vector for reporting medical information or recognised channels and procedures on infections through the medical agencies. Also is it any different to our own NHS trusts warning staff not to discuss the situation on PPE equipment which occured later in the UK. At any length this was quickly rescinded as National authorities took over control.
Yi Chun Lo - a spokesperson for the Taiwan CDC was trying to make contact with Wuhan to arrange a visit by Taiwanese disease control to Wuhan to assess the situation for themselves. He described the initial management of the outbreak as shambolic. On the 5 January the Chinese statement via the WHO was that there was no evidence of human to human transmission but that it could not be ruled out. The visit occured in mid January and in a meeting between the Taiwanese delegation on the 20 January human to human transmission was "reluctantly" admitted. According to the programme this was the cover up.
( It probably was true that the response to the initial infection was chaotic, after all it was a completely new virus, pictures from a hospital in Wuhan was very similar to pictures from Italy during their crisis in February and also to film of patients clustered on trollies from previous winters in the austerity starved NHS in Britain.)
(I have to point out that the WHO stated that human to human transmission was possible on 14 January-one week earlier than the programme stated and would seem to negate the Taiwanese claims of a cover up towards them)
23 January- China locks down Wuhan and the neighbouring province. (I will return to this later in response to comments by Desman Pilley made later in the programme.)
30 January-first case in the UK
UK scientists develop a test for Covid 19 based on the genetic sequence openly published by China on 12 January ( Note less than two weeks after the initial reports of a new infection.)
The virus spread initially with a few cases in South East Asia but then took hold in Italy. Quarantine was introduced in Northern Italy on 23 February ( the week after half term in the UK and thousands returning from skiing holidays in the region.
One Italian town Vo managed to control the infection by extensive testing of the population following the first Covid death in Italy followed by quarantining of positive cases. Based on this extensive testing Andrea Crisanti a microbiologist reported evidence of asymptomatic transmission of Covid 19. The British government was informed but did not respond (they certainly ignored the advice)
On the 3 March the UK was confident that they could test their way through coronavirus. On the 12 March the UK abandoned attempts to track positive cases. 25,000 patients were discharged into care homes without testing.
23 March-the UK was the last major European nation to lockdown.
2 April guidance stated that there was no requirement to test for Covid before care homes admitted patients. ( Of all the negligent and complacent responses to Covid in the UK this to me stands out as one of the most culpable)
In care homes relatives described no PPE being used and mixing between isolation and non isolation staff.
In China the 76 day lockdown in Wuhan.
A couple of comments from leading scientists are worth noting here
Paul Nurse stated that China was ruthless in containing Covid 19 and as a result does not question the published number of deaths.It also meant that they were (In other comments not made in the programme he has stated that with modern travel pandemics are bound to spread around the world remarkably quickly and that preventing such spread is next to impossible. I have no doubt however that 20s will believe that he is right and that the Nobel prize winning geneticist does not know what he is talking about. He also described trying to advise the government as poking blancmange.)
Now I'm going to own up to a mistake in my note taking here. I am not sure if the next quote came from Paul Nurse or Deenan Pilley but as both are eminently more qualified to comment than myself I will still include it.
China was ruthless in enforcing testing, tracing and quarantine. As a result, fewer people died and they were also able to open up their economy more readily.
Deenan Pilley stated that China published the genetic sequence to the world within two weeks of the virus being identified. This collaboration allowed diagnostic testing and vaccine development to occur so rapidly across the world. This should be applauded. (This statement is so obvious that even the most devout China hater would agree-surely!)
Boris Johnson "we will have a world beating test, track and trace in place by June 1." (Remind me again, at what point did our privatised system actually prove effective in preventing a rise in infections? Certainly not by November or December. As lock down brings down infection rates then Serco has a third chance to get it right as the country opens up again from March. Let's hope that this time it works.)
As infection rates fell following the first lockdown the government introduced its eat out to help out the virus scheme and without a working test,track and trace system sent everybody back to work (threatening job losses), back to schools and universities. This allowed the virus to spread through the young and working population and then a couple of weeks later the virus takes hold in older patients causing the devastating second wave. It is all so predictable.(and damning)
So and this is definitely my opinion and comment to 20s. The programme did not prove that China covered up for months. The programme actually confirmed the WHO timeline that you have dismissed on two occasions now. At most the delay was a couple of weeks. Now this can be criticised but as a scientist with a biochemistry degree, two weeks to confirm genetic sequencing, transmission between humans does not seem unreasonable. You could make a valid argument that the precautionary principle should have made the decisive action China took occur sooner, but to quote the often used defence of Conservatives on here, it was about balancing the risk with the potential damage to the economy. Once the risk was clear the response was determined and effective. I doubt that any other nation on the planet would have responded differently. Indeed the response of most countries in the world was slower than China, even once the effects of the virus were becoming widely known.
Praise should go to those countries that did act swiftly to contain the virus, New Zealand, Vietnam and Taiwan being the best examples.