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Yes it was preventable. If China didn’t suppress early reports of the virus (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_misinformation_by_China https://en.m.wikip

Yes it was preventable. If China didn’t suppress early reports of the virus (https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_misinformation_by_China https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_misinformation_by_C...), or if they didn’t downplay the severity of COVID-19 (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/01/world/asia/china-coronavirus.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/02/01/world/asia/china-coronavi...), or if they voluntarily shut down their international ports (https://www.foxnews.com/us/coronavirus-china-us-flights-430000-people https://www.foxnews.com/us/coronavirus-china-us-flights-4300...), then a global disaster would have been much more preventable. Likewise if the WHO didn’t just spread China’s misinformation from their platform (https://www.businessinsider.com/who-no-transmission-coronavirus-tweet-was-to-appease-china-guardian-2020-4 https://www.businessinsider.com/who-no-transmission-coronavi...), other nations could have taken action sooner. And if it does turn out that gain of function research in WIV, potentially funded by the US, led to the leak of an extra infectious coronavirus, that will have been another way in which COVID-19 was a preventable disaster. And for some reason the WHO’s delegation to visit Wuhan included Peter Daszak, despite very obvious conflicts of interest (https://dailycaller.com/2021/03/02/world-health-organization-daszak-conflict-interest/ https://dailycaller.com/2021/03/02/world-health-organization...), so we may never get a trustworthy answer on that possibility. This report mentions exactly none of that. It is a ridiculous farce, and the WHO is not to be trusted when it comes to a global retrospective on what went wrong.

belltaco 5y ago
>or if they voluntarily shut down their international ports Huh, isn't that unprecedented and would mean involuntary detention of non-citizens by preventing them from leaving?
- Nasrudith 5y ago
  Well it isn't unprecedented, especially not anymore. For one they could technically fly in Iceland but with the ash in the air it was dangerous to do so. While people were certainly annoyed nobody tried to call it a crime or denied its necessity. In practice it is more "Send them to their home country's embassy and it is their nation's job to take them back safely. They'll likely be a bit cross but if they mess up and infect themselves repatriating without proper quarantine procedures you can't blame us."
- throwawaysea 5y ago
  I am not sure if it would have been unprecedented but the Chinese government knew what the reality of the virus was from what they observed in Wuhan - they just didn’t let the rest of the world know, and the WHO didn’t want to contradict the CCP’s claims (see the Business Insider link in parent comment). This delayed travel bans issued by other nations, such as Trump’s ban (issued on Jan 31). China didn’t stop international flights themselves until late March (https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/blogs/Whathappensif/how-china-locked-down-internally-for-covid-19-but-pushed-foreign-travel/ https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/blogs/Whathappensif/how...).
  - whimsicalism 5y ago
    China was warning about the virus pretty early on. When you compare the timescales that China is being criticized on with the timescales for the US or Europe to react, it's laughable. People criticize China for taking days to release information when it took weeks if not months for most of the developed world to do absolutely anything. I was in China in early-mid january, there were warnings about the Wuhan virus all over all of the airports, it was not being hidden.
    - throwawaysea 5y ago
      That's very interesting. Thanks for sharing. Out of curiosity, did they actually call it the "Wuhan virus" in the warnings you are referencing? How do you reconcile the transparency you saw on the ground with the fact that early reports were suppressed or downplayed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_misinformation_by_China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_misinformation_by_Chi...), or that a journalist was arrested and sentenced to years of jail for reporting on COVID (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/28/world/asia/china-Zhang-Zhan-covid-convicted.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/28/world/asia/china-Zhang-Zh...), or that China may have misled the world and hoarded COVID supplies (https://abc7news.com/china-misled-world-coronavirus-us/6147033/ https://abc7news.com/china-misled-world-coronavirus-us/61470...). Is it possible that China was trying to walk a fine line by being transparent in those settings where it would be futile to lie, while acting differently in other settings to serve their own interests as much as possible? I'm genuinely curious to hear the opinion of someone who was in the middle of all this.

belltaco 5y ago

>or if they voluntarily shut down their international ports Huh, isn't that unprecedented and would mean involuntary detention of non-citizens by preventing them from leaving?

Nasrudith 5y ago
Well it isn't unprecedented, especially not anymore. For one they could technically fly in Iceland but with the ash in the air it was dangerous to do so. While people were certainly annoyed nobody tried to call it a crime or denied its necessity. In practice it is more "Send them to their home country's embassy and it is their nation's job to take them back safely. They'll likely be a bit cross but if they mess up and infect themselves repatriating without proper quarantine procedures you can't blame us."
throwawaysea 5y ago
I am not sure if it would have been unprecedented but the Chinese government knew what the reality of the virus was from what they observed in Wuhan - they just didn’t let the rest of the world know, and the WHO didn’t want to contradict the CCP’s claims (see the Business Insider link in parent comment). This delayed travel bans issued by other nations, such as Trump’s ban (issued on Jan 31). China didn’t stop international flights themselves until late March (https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/blogs/Whathappensif/how-china-locked-down-internally-for-covid-19-but-pushed-foreign-travel/ https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/blogs/Whathappensif/how...).
- whimsicalism 5y ago
  China was warning about the virus pretty early on. When you compare the timescales that China is being criticized on with the timescales for the US or Europe to react, it's laughable. People criticize China for taking days to release information when it took weeks if not months for most of the developed world to do absolutely anything. I was in China in early-mid january, there were warnings about the Wuhan virus all over all of the airports, it was not being hidden.
  - throwawaysea 5y ago
    That's very interesting. Thanks for sharing. Out of curiosity, did they actually call it the "Wuhan virus" in the warnings you are referencing? How do you reconcile the transparency you saw on the ground with the fact that early reports were suppressed or downplayed (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_misinformation_by_China https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/COVID-19_misinformation_by_Chi...), or that a journalist was arrested and sentenced to years of jail for reporting on COVID (https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/28/world/asia/china-Zhang-Zhan-covid-convicted.html https://www.nytimes.com/2020/12/28/world/asia/china-Zhang-Zh...), or that China may have misled the world and hoarded COVID supplies (https://abc7news.com/china-misled-world-coronavirus-us/6147033/ https://abc7news.com/china-misled-world-coronavirus-us/61470...). Is it possible that China was trying to walk a fine line by being transparent in those settings where it would be futile to lie, while acting differently in other settings to serve their own interests as much as possible? I'm genuinely curious to hear the opinion of someone who was in the middle of all this.