5.3.2.3. Censorship of the 2019 Corona Virus (2019冠状病毒病早期迹象审查)
The Chinese Government censored the initial outbreak in January and did not inform Wuhan on January 8, which likely made the situation much worse than what it could have been.
On the other hand, one may argue that the "city closure" measures were stronger/faster than in democracies, and maybe that is true.
And Ciro Santilli (三西猴, anti-CCP fanatic, 反中共狂热, stupid cunt, 傻屄, CIA agent, CIA特工, 肏你妈的) does believe that the virus would have escaped even if there had been no censorship. Although maybe thousands of lives would have been saved due to smaller saturation of hospitals had a proper early warning been given.
So Ciro’s main criticism is that of the censorship of citizen reports the event: People arrested for reporting on the 2019 Corona Virus (因报道 2019 年冠状病毒而被捕的人). Why do you need to censor things when you are doing so well?
And it should also be said that some Western politicians have used "blame China" as an excuse to divert attention from their own failures.
Some believe that the Chinese government grossly under-reported death counts. Initial official figures were about only 3300 deaths, in the insanely densely populated Wuhan area, while Italy had reached 10000 deaths:
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2022-04 https://www.voanews.com/a/china-censors-national-anthem-lyrics-used-as-lockdown-protest-/6539716.html China Censors Chinese National Anthem (义勇军进行曲, 1978) Lyrics Used as Lockdown Protest on Voice of america (VOA, 美国之音, USA government media)
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2020-04-19 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nr280LWjJT0&t=2198 Trump says on a White House briefing he does not believe China’s case count
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2020-04-01 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-01/china-concealed-extent-of-virus-outbreak-u-s-intelligence-says CIA speaks
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2020-03-29 https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8165717/Locals-Wuhan-believe-42-000-people-died-coronavirus.html Reports of funerary urns sold
Maybe China is saying the truth this time. Maybe the rapid Dictatorship response worked. But maybe the most important lesson to take out of this is that no one trusts in a Dictatorship after an infinitely long history of lies and lack of freedom of the press.
Li Hongzhi (李洪志, LHZ, Falun Gong prophet) of course doubts those numbers :-) Falun Gong’s view of epidemics (法轮功的流行病观).
Good timelines so without a fucking paywall:
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https://www.axios.com/timeline-the-early-days-of-chinas-coronavirus-outbreak-and-cover-up-ee65211a-afb6-4641-97b8-353718a5faab.html "Timeline: The early days of China’s coronavirus outbreak and cover-up"
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Timeline:
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2019-12-27 several genomics companies had sequenced the coronavirus and noticed the similarity to Sars. According to GeneBank, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/MT019529 the sample was collected on and 23-Dec-2019 and published on 04-FEB-2020
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2020-01-01 China Central Television (CCTV, 中国中央电视台, 央视, CCP media) announces that posting about it online is a crime: https://www.reddit.com/r/China/comments/ko18aa/on_this_day_one_year_ago_cctv_first_reported_on/
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2020-01-03 findings were sent to the Centre for Disease Control (CDC, 中国疾病预防控制中心) in Beijing, but then the Chinese National Health Commission (中华人民共和国国家卫生健康委员会), China’s top medical authority, issued orders to not talk about it and destroy samples
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2020-01-08 CDC team went to Wuhan to see the situation, was not informed that contagiousness of the disease had been confirmed
-
2020-01-20 the findings were made public, in an interview with Zhong Nanshan. He later said in an interview that the local government should be blamed:
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2020-01-23 Wuhan begins lockdown
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2020-01-24 to 30 Chinese New Year
News coverage:
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2021-03-04 https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/china-makes-anal-swab-covid-tests-compulsory-for-foreign-arrivals-mvthjq8c7 "China makes anal swab Covid tests compulsory for foreign arrivals". This is not a criticism to China as the test might be accurate. But it is one of the funniest things I’ve ever heard.
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2020-12-20 https://www.propublica.org/article/leaked-documents-show-how-chinas-army-of-paid-internet-trolls-helped-censor-the-coronavirus "Leaked Documents Show How China’s Army of Paid Internet Trolls Helped Censor the Coronavirus" talks about Wumao (五毛) working during COVID
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2020-05-12: https://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-cia-believes-china-tried-stop-who-alarm-pandemic-1503565 CIA people said China stopped the WHO from sounding the alarm from January 24 to January 30, while at the same time stockpiling protection materials
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Caixin (财新传媒) article about how early Coronavirus signs were censored:
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https://china.caixin.com/2020-03-10/101526309.html (archive) "李文亮所在医院为何医护人员伤亡惨重？" (Why did Li Wenliang’s [李文亮] hospital suffer heavy casualties?)
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https://www.caixinglobal.com/2020-02-29/in-depth-how-early-signs-of-a-sars-like-virus-were-spotted-spread-and-throttled-101521745.html (paywall) "In Depth: How Early Signs of a SARS-Like Virus Were Spotted, Spread, and Throttled"
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https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/chinese-scientists-destroyed-proof-of-virus-in-december-rz055qjnj "Chinese scientists destroyed proof of virus in December". Paywall skip: https://archive.md/xOKiu Terrible copy paste of some Caixin article with no sources/precise names.
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https://www.businessinsider.com/china-information-crackdown-on-wuhan-coronavirus-2020-1 "China spent the crucial first days of the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak arresting people who posted about it online and threatening journalists" (archive)
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https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/g5xykx/you-can-now-go-to-jail-in-china-for-criticizing-beijings-coronavirus-response "You Can Now Go to Jail in China for Criticizing Beijing’s Coronavirus Response"
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https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qjdn4d/doctors-in-wuhan-are-still-dying-and-beijing-is-still-trying-to-silence-them Ai Fen’s (艾芬) report of how the situation was mishandling was censored
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2020-04-13 https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/12/asia/china-coronavirus-research-restrictions-intl-hnk/index.html "Beijing tightens grip over coronavirus research, amid US-China row on virus origin". The Government can now veto papers from being published on the subject of the origin of COVID-19.
In other countries:
Figure 9. Assemblage of a respirator mask with a BDSM gag ball (口塞) attached to it, suggesting that citizen reports of COVID-19 in China have been censored. Source.
Figure 10. Corona Xi mural of Xi Jinping (习近平, 2012-∞, Heil卐!) morphed into a Coronavirus by Lushux. Fuller composition view: https://twitter.com/lushsux/status/1243830638966235136. Reddit called it Winnie the Flu in a reference to Xi Jinping looks like Winnie-the-Pooh (习近平长得像小熊维尼, 2017). Source.
Figure 11. Comparison of how some Chinese sources counted COVID deaths excluding Taiwan (Republic of China, 台湾, 中華民國) and Hong Kong (香港), while at the same time including their gold medals in their gold medal count to overcome the United States' medal count. TODO original untranslated source. Source.
The Chinese Government censored the initial outbreak in January and did not inform Wuhan on January 8, which likely made the situation much worse than what it could have been.
On the other hand, one may argue that the "city closure" measures were stronger/faster than in democracies, and maybe that is true.
And Ciro Santilli (三西猴, anti-CCP fanatic, 反中共狂热, stupid cunt, 傻屄, CIA agent, CIA特工, 肏你妈的) does believe that the virus would have escaped even if there had been no censorship. Although maybe thousands of lives would have been saved due to smaller saturation of hospitals had a proper early warning been given.
So Ciro’s main criticism is that of the censorship of citizen reports the event: People arrested for reporting on the 2019 Corona Virus (因报道 2019 年冠状病毒而被捕的人). Why do you need to censor things when you are doing so well?
And it should also be said that some Western politicians have used "blame China" as an excuse to divert attention from their own failures.
Some believe that the Chinese government grossly under-reported death counts. Initial official figures were about only 3300 deaths, in the insanely densely populated Wuhan area, while Italy had reached 10000 deaths:
-
2022-04 https://www.voanews.com/a/china-censors-national-anthem-lyrics-used-as-lockdown-protest-/6539716.html China Censors Chinese National Anthem (义勇军进行曲, 1978) Lyrics Used as Lockdown Protest on Voice of america (VOA, 美国之音, USA government media)
-
2020-04-19 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Nr280LWjJT0&t=2198 Trump says on a White House briefing he does not believe China’s case count
-
2020-04-01 https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-04-01/china-concealed-extent-of-virus-outbreak-u-s-intelligence-says CIA speaks
-
2020-03-29 https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-8165717/Locals-Wuhan-believe-42-000-people-died-coronavirus.html Reports of funerary urns sold
Maybe China is saying the truth this time. Maybe the rapid Dictatorship response worked. But maybe the most important lesson to take out of this is that no one trusts in a Dictatorship after an infinitely long history of lies and lack of freedom of the press.
Li Hongzhi (李洪志, LHZ, Falun Gong prophet) of course doubts those numbers :-) Falun Gong’s view of epidemics (法轮功的流行病观).
Good timelines so without a fucking paywall:
-
https://www.axios.com/timeline-the-early-days-of-chinas-coronavirus-outbreak-and-cover-up-ee65211a-afb6-4641-97b8-353718a5faab.html "Timeline: The early days of China’s coronavirus outbreak and cover-up"
Timeline:
-
2019-12-27 several genomics companies had sequenced the coronavirus and noticed the similarity to Sars. According to GeneBank, https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/nuccore/MT019529 the sample was collected on and 23-Dec-2019 and published on 04-FEB-2020
-
2020-01-01 China Central Television (CCTV, 中国中央电视台, 央视, CCP media) announces that posting about it online is a crime: https://www.reddit.com/r/China/comments/ko18aa/on_this_day_one_year_ago_cctv_first_reported_on/
-
2020-01-03 findings were sent to the Centre for Disease Control (CDC, 中国疾病预防控制中心) in Beijing, but then the Chinese National Health Commission (中华人民共和国国家卫生健康委员会), China’s top medical authority, issued orders to not talk about it and destroy samples
-
2020-01-08 CDC team went to Wuhan to see the situation, was not informed that contagiousness of the disease had been confirmed
-
2020-01-20 the findings were made public, in an interview with Zhong Nanshan. He later said in an interview that the local government should be blamed:
-
2020-01-23 Wuhan begins lockdown
-
2020-01-24 to 30 Chinese New Year
News coverage:
-
2021-03-04 https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/china-makes-anal-swab-covid-tests-compulsory-for-foreign-arrivals-mvthjq8c7 "China makes anal swab Covid tests compulsory for foreign arrivals". This is not a criticism to China as the test might be accurate. But it is one of the funniest things I’ve ever heard.
-
2020-12-20 https://www.propublica.org/article/leaked-documents-show-how-chinas-army-of-paid-internet-trolls-helped-censor-the-coronavirus "Leaked Documents Show How China’s Army of Paid Internet Trolls Helped Censor the Coronavirus" talks about Wumao (五毛) working during COVID
-
2020-05-12: https://www.newsweek.com/exclusive-cia-believes-china-tried-stop-who-alarm-pandemic-1503565 CIA people said China stopped the WHO from sounding the alarm from January 24 to January 30, while at the same time stockpiling protection materials
-
Caixin (财新传媒) article about how early Coronavirus signs were censored:
-
https://china.caixin.com/2020-03-10/101526309.html (archive) "李文亮所在医院为何医护人员伤亡惨重？" (Why did Li Wenliang’s [李文亮] hospital suffer heavy casualties?)
-
https://www.caixinglobal.com/2020-02-29/in-depth-how-early-signs-of-a-sars-like-virus-were-spotted-spread-and-throttled-101521745.html (paywall) "In Depth: How Early Signs of a SARS-Like Virus Were Spotted, Spread, and Throttled"
-
https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/chinese-scientists-destroyed-proof-of-virus-in-december-rz055qjnj "Chinese scientists destroyed proof of virus in December". Paywall skip: https://archive.md/xOKiu Terrible copy paste of some Caixin article with no sources/precise names.
-
-
https://www.businessinsider.com/china-information-crackdown-on-wuhan-coronavirus-2020-1 "China spent the crucial first days of the Wuhan coronavirus outbreak arresting people who posted about it online and threatening journalists" (archive)
-
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/g5xykx/you-can-now-go-to-jail-in-china-for-criticizing-beijings-coronavirus-response "You Can Now Go to Jail in China for Criticizing Beijing’s Coronavirus Response"
-
https://www.vice.com/en_us/article/qjdn4d/doctors-in-wuhan-are-still-dying-and-beijing-is-still-trying-to-silence-them Ai Fen’s (艾芬) report of how the situation was mishandling was censored
-
2020-04-13 https://edition.cnn.com/2020/04/12/asia/china-coronavirus-research-restrictions-intl-hnk/index.html "Beijing tightens grip over coronavirus research, amid US-China row on virus origin". The Government can now veto papers from being published on the subject of the origin of COVID-19.
In other countries: