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Would things have been different if it had started in a country other than China? Politics aside, starting in the most populous and most trafficked country on E

Would things have been different if it had started in a country other than China? Politics aside, starting in the most populous and most trafficked country on Earth seems like the worst-case scenario.

beager 7y ago
Population density is a factor to be sure, but the government response was a bigger factor in failing to contain it in my opinion. The CCP’s culture of fear and retribution pushed municipal officials to suppress reports of a novel outbreak, and pushed authorities to retaliate against medical professionals sounding the alarm. A culture of transparency and non-retribution may have enabled China to contain this, and could have provided earlier warnings to the world to prepare for an epidemic or pandemic that might not have even happened.
- KaoruAoiShiho 7y ago
  I guess some people actually believe this. The new orientalism?
  - 49531 7y ago
    Yea, unfortunately that seems to be the case. While local level officials in Wuhan punished some early whistleblowers for posting publicly about the virus the Chinese Supreme Peoples Court said they should not have been punished. I think China has shown a lot of transparency and has put a ton of resources towards containment.
- iforgotpassword 7y ago
  I agree with your initial reasoning, although given the long incubation period that was initially unknown I still see a high chance this would have spread either way. But > and could have provided earlier warnings to the world to prepare for an epidemic or pandemic that might not have even happened. Not in a thousand years. The west was sitting on their hands for almost two months, busy armchair-commenting on the CCP's failings, preparing half-heartedly at best, taking no proactive measures whatsoever. I'm utterly disappointed with my government and don't see how this would have turned out any different for us had we had twice as much time to prepare, or had this originated in a western country.
- bcrosby95 7y ago
  A handful of countries were able to prevent an epidemic in their own country because they responded quickly. The vast majority of them ignored the virus and claimed it wouldn't come here, and changed their tune only when it was too late. China gave a perfectly fine head start as evidenced by countries that were able to contain it. Everyone else just wasted the head start, and I see no evidence that they wouldn't have wasted it even if China gave them a longer one.
  - misun78 7y ago
    Which countries are you referring to?
  - wpasc 7y ago
    The first US case was diagnosed on Jan 19 2020. The US-China border was closed on Feb 2. Screening procedures followed later on. It is up for debate whether or not screening procedures would have started earlier if the border had closed earlier. BUT, to say there is no evidence at all that a longer head start would have helped countries is a very dubious claim.
mratsim 7y ago
And also the most probable, especially given the diet in some of the regions. That said, some countries in Africa also eat bats and pangolin and Ebola came.
- WorldMaker 7y ago
  Diet is most probably a giant red herring in all this. There's just no "right diet" if you want to avoid disease mutation. Mad Cow Disease, Salmonella, Avian Flu, Swine Flu, all of those and more have (and continue to) cross-infect our species from standard western diets. Several major western religions ban pork for "uncleanliness"/prone-to-disease, for what were once very good historical reasons. Even if this virus did have something to do with diet, the only rational response is to cut way back on all meat, not just "weird" meat to a Western view, because it isn't just "rodents" or "ugly animals" that mutate these sorts of virus, because we've seen it with pigs, chickens, cows, etc. Probably no one wants mandatory veganism, but that's nearly the only "safe" option if you want to demand we track regional diets. (Even then you get things like salmonella cross-infections from fertilizers used in vegetable farming. There's no 100% safe diet. Life, uh, finds a way.)
  - atomi 7y ago
    We regularly euthanize diseased pigs and chickens because of viral outbreaks - sometimes millions at a time. We would do well to try not eating so much animal protein.
save_ferris 7y ago
We'll never know, but it's worth pointing out that the slow and disorganized response by many western countries like the US and UK seemed to be less influenced by where the disease originated and more heavily influenced by a localized desire to pretend everything was normal. I have a hard time seeing a different outcome if a virus of similar potency came out of Africa or somewhere else, based solely on how poorly leaders from around the world have responded to it.
- api 7y ago
  Things like responding to a pandemic are precisely where authoritarian regimes excel. Authoritarian structures generally excel when you need a lot of people to do a lot of the same thing: responding to disasters in simple but effective ways, high volume manufacturing, grunt and infantry level military operations, and large infrastructure projects. These are the areas where China leads the world. With the possible exception of the military, America and other Western democracies are downright horrible at these things. We can't build infrastructure, have lost much of our high volume manufacturing, and react to disasters with delay and bickering and population non-compliance. Where they don't excel is creativity, invention, innovation, culture creation, and maximizing individual well being in peacetime. They're also more politically brittle because there is no graceful mechanism for non-violent political change.
  - iron0013 7y ago
    Chinese style technocratic authoritarianism might excel in the face of pandemic, but one need look no farther than Brazil to see that old-fashioned grievance-based reactionary authoritarianism falls flat on its face when it needs to deal with any problem that can’t be swept under the rug by blaming it on a group of “Others”
  - save_ferris 7y ago
    It's also much easier for authoritarian regimes to give off such impressions when they can lock up and execute whistle-blowers and critics without with access to any semblance of a just legal system.
  - 7y ago
brianwawok 7y ago
I have no idea how to figure this out. But my thought process is: What % of people in a given region in a given month travel outside: a) Their city b) Their state/providence c) Their country? and then compare it to other countries. I suspect there are many places it could have started with way more international travel.. which would have made the first wave hit more places at once.
- nocorpwelfare 7y ago
  There is a large contingent of itinerant fools who travel the world endlessly in search of identity yet never locate it.

beager 7y ago

Population density is a factor to be sure, but the government response was a bigger factor in failing to contain it in my opinion. The CCP’s culture of fear and retribution pushed municipal officials to suppress reports of a novel outbreak, and pushed authorities to retaliate against medical professionals sounding the alarm. A culture of transparency and non-retribution may have enabled China to contain this, and could have provided earlier warnings to the world to prepare for an epidemic or pandemic that might not have even happened.

KaoruAoiShiho 7y ago
I guess some people actually believe this. The new orientalism?
- 49531 7y ago
  Yea, unfortunately that seems to be the case. While local level officials in Wuhan punished some early whistleblowers for posting publicly about the virus the Chinese Supreme Peoples Court said they should not have been punished. I think China has shown a lot of transparency and has put a ton of resources towards containment.
iforgotpassword 7y ago
I agree with your initial reasoning, although given the long incubation period that was initially unknown I still see a high chance this would have spread either way. But > and could have provided earlier warnings to the world to prepare for an epidemic or pandemic that might not have even happened. Not in a thousand years. The west was sitting on their hands for almost two months, busy armchair-commenting on the CCP's failings, preparing half-heartedly at best, taking no proactive measures whatsoever. I'm utterly disappointed with my government and don't see how this would have turned out any different for us had we had twice as much time to prepare, or had this originated in a western country.
bcrosby95 7y ago
A handful of countries were able to prevent an epidemic in their own country because they responded quickly. The vast majority of them ignored the virus and claimed it wouldn't come here, and changed their tune only when it was too late. China gave a perfectly fine head start as evidenced by countries that were able to contain it. Everyone else just wasted the head start, and I see no evidence that they wouldn't have wasted it even if China gave them a longer one.
- misun78 7y ago
  Which countries are you referring to?
- wpasc 7y ago
  The first US case was diagnosed on Jan 19 2020. The US-China border was closed on Feb 2. Screening procedures followed later on. It is up for debate whether or not screening procedures would have started earlier if the border had closed earlier. BUT, to say there is no evidence at all that a longer head start would have helped countries is a very dubious claim.

mratsim 7y ago

And also the most probable, especially given the diet in some of the regions. That said, some countries in Africa also eat bats and pangolin and Ebola came.

WorldMaker 7y ago
Diet is most probably a giant red herring in all this. There's just no "right diet" if you want to avoid disease mutation. Mad Cow Disease, Salmonella, Avian Flu, Swine Flu, all of those and more have (and continue to) cross-infect our species from standard western diets. Several major western religions ban pork for "uncleanliness"/prone-to-disease, for what were once very good historical reasons. Even if this virus did have something to do with diet, the only rational response is to cut way back on all meat, not just "weird" meat to a Western view, because it isn't just "rodents" or "ugly animals" that mutate these sorts of virus, because we've seen it with pigs, chickens, cows, etc. Probably no one wants mandatory veganism, but that's nearly the only "safe" option if you want to demand we track regional diets. (Even then you get things like salmonella cross-infections from fertilizers used in vegetable farming. There's no 100% safe diet. Life, uh, finds a way.)
- atomi 7y ago
  We regularly euthanize diseased pigs and chickens because of viral outbreaks - sometimes millions at a time. We would do well to try not eating so much animal protein.

save_ferris 7y ago

We'll never know, but it's worth pointing out that the slow and disorganized response by many western countries like the US and UK seemed to be less influenced by where the disease originated and more heavily influenced by a localized desire to pretend everything was normal. I have a hard time seeing a different outcome if a virus of similar potency came out of Africa or somewhere else, based solely on how poorly leaders from around the world have responded to it.

api 7y ago
Things like responding to a pandemic are precisely where authoritarian regimes excel. Authoritarian structures generally excel when you need a lot of people to do a lot of the same thing: responding to disasters in simple but effective ways, high volume manufacturing, grunt and infantry level military operations, and large infrastructure projects. These are the areas where China leads the world. With the possible exception of the military, America and other Western democracies are downright horrible at these things. We can't build infrastructure, have lost much of our high volume manufacturing, and react to disasters with delay and bickering and population non-compliance. Where they don't excel is creativity, invention, innovation, culture creation, and maximizing individual well being in peacetime. They're also more politically brittle because there is no graceful mechanism for non-violent political change.
- iron0013 7y ago
  Chinese style technocratic authoritarianism might excel in the face of pandemic, but one need look no farther than Brazil to see that old-fashioned grievance-based reactionary authoritarianism falls flat on its face when it needs to deal with any problem that can’t be swept under the rug by blaming it on a group of “Others”
- save_ferris 7y ago
  It's also much easier for authoritarian regimes to give off such impressions when they can lock up and execute whistle-blowers and critics without with access to any semblance of a just legal system.
- 7y ago

brianwawok 7y ago

I have no idea how to figure this out. But my thought process is: What % of people in a given region in a given month travel outside: a) Their city b) Their state/providence c) Their country? and then compare it to other countries. I suspect there are many places it could have started with way more international travel.. which would have made the first wave hit more places at once.

nocorpwelfare 7y ago
There is a large contingent of itinerant fools who travel the world endlessly in search of identity yet never locate it.