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I personally enjoyed the hypocrisy of China initially requesting Nations to not "overreact" and close borders to its travelers (mid February), then proceeding t
by hkmurakami 7y ago
I personally enjoyed the hypocrisy of China initially requesting Nations to not "overreact" and close borders to its travelers (mid February), then proceeding to do exactly this towards these same nations (mid March) when things became worse overseas.
- philliphaydon 7y agoDuring Swine Flu outbreak in 2009 china closed it's borders to Mexico, but turns around and says it's unfair when people close their borders to china. Then proceeded to close their borders AGAIN. facepalm
- Medicalidiot 7y agoSARS happened in 2002-2004, no?
- philliphaydon 7y agoYou're right, I'm thinking Swine Flu. Thanks.
- ftvy 7y agoSARS was closer to 1999-2000.
- Medicalidiot 7y agoNo, it wasn't https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Severe_acute_respiratory_syndrome#Outbreak_in_South_China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Severe_acute_respiratory_syndr...
- ftvy 7y agoI remembered incorrectly. Thanks for the link.
- sct202 7y agoNo one has to listen to the CCP. The CCP acts offended by everything.
- surge 7y agoThe problem is, the WHO does, they even said this thing wasn't transmitted person to person. And they're supposed to be the authority everyone was saying to listen to.
- henearkr 7y agoI think that the WHO communication was proportionate to the current knowledge at the time of each of their interventions. First of all they said, when it was clear there was a problem "We have a simple message for all countries: test, test, test." (and then Trump and almost everybody else did not want to hear that) And moreover they said more exactly, some time before the previous item, that "Preliminary investigations conducted by the Chinese authorities have found no clear evidence of human-to-human transmission". So your position is a deformation of their words.
- blub 7y agoNo. The WHO constantly downplayed this pandemic and kowtowed to China to the point of disgracefully delaying calling it a pandemic and then playing catch-up when individual countries started ignoring the WHO and implemented their own measures. Then the WHO switched gears and complained that the countries were doing too little too late. They've been almost completely worthless in this crisis.
- reaperducer 7y agoThe WHO constantly downplayed this pandemic and kowtowed to China See also: The whole WHO/Taiwan debacle, which is still ongoing. The WHO is OK risking the lives of people in Taiwan in order to keep the mainland happy. You would think that the WHO would put the health of people, regardless of where they live, ahead of politics.
- yibg 7y agoSeems like a pretty common thing from major powers doesn't it. Maybe it's just human nature? e.g. US banning exports of respirators but throwing a tantrum when India tries to ban the export of hydroxychloroquine. Not sure what the solution here is, but it certainly does seem it's everyone for themselves in these situations.
- throwawaysea 7y agoNot just China but the WHO, who recommended no international travel restrictions very late into this crisis (https://www.who.int/news-room/articles-detail/who-advice-for-international-travel-and-trade-in-relation-to-the-outbreak-of-pneumonia-caused-by-a-new-coronavirus-in-china https://www.who.int/news-room/articles-detail/who-advice-for...), then ignored Taiwan’s requests in favor of Beijing propaganda and claimed the virus does not transmit between humans (https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2020-04-05/taiwan-s-advance-on-who-in-covid-19-shows-its-place-in-world https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2020-04-05/taiwan...), and has repeated failures seen in their response to other health crises (https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/14/asia/coronavirus-who-china-intl-hnk/index.html https://www.cnn.com/2020/02/14/asia/coronavirus-who-china-in...).
- systemvoltage 7y agoIn addition, WHO is heavily influenced by China; here is an interview with a senior WHO official who was asked about Taiwan - he simply hangs up the phone: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlCYFh8U2xM https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UlCYFh8U2xM
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- FooBarWidget 7y agoWHO does not officially recognize Taiwan because the UN does not officially recognize Taiwan, and the WHO is a UN organization. It is as simple as that. If you disagree then you gotta take it to the UN. The poor guys at the WHO just want to focus on fighting diseases, and yet everybody is trying to use them for political agendas. If I was that guy I would be inclined to shut down too.
- foobiekr 7y agoHis behavior was nonetheless completely unprofessional. He could easily have stated, exactly as you did, the situation and asked to move on.
- AtomicOrbital 7y agowhen china shutdown domestic movement into/out of Wuhan they kept open international movement into/out of Wuhan ... at the same time neighbor countries with china tried to block cross boarder movement yet china forced those trade routes to stay open well after Wuhan had entered lockdown - pure evil
- vezycash 7y ago>when china shutdown domestic movement into/out of Wuhan they kept open international movement into/out of Wuhan I'd like someone else to confirm this because I've not heard about this before now.
- mytailorisrich 7y agoA quick Googing indicates that Wuhan airport closed when the city was put into lockdown and re-opened yesterday when the lockdown of the city was lifted. This makes sense considering that, when the lockdown started, many countries had to discuss with the Chinese government in order to allow special flights to evacuate their citizens.
- FooBarWidget 7y ago> when china shutdown domestic movement into/out of Wuhan they kept open international movement into/out of Wuhan Evidence for this claim? I believe they closed all movement, including international flights.
- deleted 7y ago[deleted]
- bigpumpkin 7y agoThis is false, by the time they shut down movement out of Wuhan, the airport was closed. There were, however, people who already left Wuhan who then left the country. There were also repatriation flights out of Wuhan.
- 7y ago
- mytailorisrich 7y agoI don't think it's hypocrisy. At the time the vast majority of the cases in China were in Wuhan and Hubei, which had been put on lockdown with airports closed, but the rest of the country has much fewer cases. No country imposed full ban on travels with countries that had the number of cases seen in China outside Wuhan/Hubei. Whether this was the right or wrong decision to make is another issue. The same discussion can be had about travellers from Italy just a few weeks later. At the end of the day it is also down to each country to make its own decision on who to accept.
- surge 7y agoThe much fewer cases thing was because doctors were being told to lie about the numbers or attribute it to viral pneumonia, they were carrying off bodies and quarantining sections of cities elsewhere too, you just had to look at WeChat to see it.
- mytailorisrich 7y agoCan we please stop this? HN sinks to the gutter every time China pops up as a subject and no discussion is possible, as seen from the reaction to my previous comment.
- surge 7y agoHN isn't sinking into the gutter calling out a government for doing horrifying things, spreading misinformation, suppressing accurate information, all to save face/embarrassment and keep its economy. People here read alternate sources of news, see the videos leaking out on the Internet, they're very savy and know that any reporting that rely on CCP as primary source of info are bird cage liner. The CCP acted in bad faith, and the world suffered for it, and this isn't the first time.
- mytailorisrich 7y agoYou are proving my point with this bigoted response so please no need to bother 'replying' to my comments. Thanks.
- systemvoltage 7y agoCCP does not understand that playing asymmetric games from business laws (booting Uber off of China for example), diplomacy and global influence, etc is damaging long term brand and goodwill. In this pandemic, democratic nations are suffering more than authoritarian regimes purely by choice - complete Wuhan style measures are unacceptable say in Sweden. This asymmetry is going to give a short term boost to China. Long term, my opinion is that western democracies will realize what they’re against - all eggs in a single totalitarian basket - is a bad idea. Manufacturing and reliance on China will change. It is already changing: https://www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/articles/2020-04-08/japan-to-fund-firms-to-shift-production-out-of-china https://www.bloomberg.com/amp/news/articles/2020-04-08/japan...
- showbufire 7y agobooting off Uber? Have you ever used Uber and its local competitor Didi in China? I've used both multiple times. The competition was just too much, both companies were losing money at a pace that's not sustainable. The Uber China business was acquired, and in return Uber received cash and stakes in Didi.
- systemvoltage 7y agoOh come on, there is no denying that China subsidizes local businesses asymmetrically. I've lived in China and have used Didi.
- chrischen 7y agoI don’t think you can claim definitively that that is why Uber lost. Uber lost in other markets too, like in Southeast Asia. I don’t think anyone can win this argument with you since you can always claim that the Chinese government favors local companies, so therefore ____ lost. But at least I can give some counterpoints: Tesla hasn’t lost in China.
- novok 7y agoIf you look into the details you'll find out that in typical CCP fashion they were tipping the scales on Didi.
- addHocker 7y agoThe whole diagou - parallel trader system - and lots of external companies, who usually buy cosmetics and milkpowder, where state instructed to buy masks & medical supplies en bulk, to ship back to china. All this, while the WHO claimed that nothing dangerous was going on and trade should be prohibited. The WHO should be disbanded and replaced by a organisation, with votes- based on public health track-records. All nations that didnt trust the whole setup and had there own warning systems in place (taiwan, south-korea, japan) did well in this crisis.