A new report shows China’s efforts to hide the spread of COVID-19 in the first weeks of the pandemic while Chinese propaganda continues to blame others for the virus. Some are not shocked by the report and claim they’ve been reporting similar news for months.
Summary
After reviewing what CNN has characterized as leaked documents from Chinese officials, a new report from the network offers a clearer view on what authorities knew at the time and refused to share with the world.
- The documents show a previously-unreported outbreak of an influenza in early December, along with “pattern of institutional failings.”
- According to the report, in early to mid-February China had more than double the number of coronavirus cases than it officially reported.
- Meanwhile, Chinese state media are pushing propaganda refuting the claim that COVID-19 originated in Wuhan, China, citing Chinese scientists’ theories the virus “was brought to Wuhan by frozen foods or their packaging.”
- NBC News has documented Chinese and Russian television broadcasting baseless claims in the Arab world that the virus was an American biological weapon.
- Science Magazine revealed a group of scientists in the Chinese military received an experimental vaccine back in February, using what it called the “unfashionable stalwart” of the entire virus, though “inactivated”, a technique used for nearly a century.
- Pharmaceutical companies in China have developed four vaccine candidates and have actually begun deploying it, injecting hundreds of thousands of citizens, mostly state workers.
- Intelligence officials believe China has shared a vaccine with North Korea, inoculating leader Kim Jong Un and other members of the country’s ruling elite.
- The Guardian’s report of China’s propaganda shifting blame notes that studies they have published have not been peer-reviewed and none of the theories of a non-Chinese origin are given much credibility by scientists in the West.
- A report from the New York Times earlier this month showed how the World Health Organization willingly took a backseat to China in the investigation into the origins of the virus, and claimed these actions served as an opportunity for President Trump to “push speculation and unfounded conspiracy theories.”
- While the Washington Post has yet to report on the recent reports of China’s deception, earlier in November the outlet suggested “China has controlled the virus so well” that efforts can be focused on identifying and eliminating the least likely of transmission vectors, such as frozen food packaging.
- Many commentators and pundits on the right ridiculed CNN for its report, with Fox News summarizing the scorn and some pundits unearthing reports from the outlet that sided with China earlier in the year.
- The New York Post quotes the director of the China Studies Program at Johns Hopkins University: “China had an image to protect internationally, and lower-ranking officials had a clear incentive to under-report”.
- Conservative outlet The Federalist blasted CNN for presenting this as a bombshell, noting its own reporting over the year showing China’s duplicity and deception.
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© Dallas Gerber, 2020
