Over the weekend, China, cheered by the low number of cases, almost raised quarantine barriers, even in Wuhan itself. It lasted only a couple of hours - and the quarantine was restored. No, someday it will definitely get better, but at first it seems to be worse.
What the Chinese authorities are hiding about the coronavirus
China has published the first relatively detailed study of clinical cases and statistics on 44 thousand patients with Covid-19.
It has several interesting points. The overall mortality from the virus is 2.3%. This is much more than from the "ordinary" flu, but much less than from other coronaviruses, such as Sars or Mers.
According to official data:
- about 80% of those infected get sick without risk to life and serious complications;
- 14 people per 100 cases develop pneumonia;
- give multiple organ failure, including shock and kidney damage of the order of 4.9%;
- die 2.3.
Virologists are rather skeptical of these statistics - China hides the scale of the epidemic. WHO experts believe that the report did not include at least cases when the test showed the presence of the virus, but the disease did not develop. Analysts suggest that the number of cases is much higher than official figures. The true number of deaths is unknown.
Observers conclude that the decline in applications and the increase in the number of free beds in hospitals in China is not true. The Chinese are afraid to go to hospitals because of medical experiments on sick people. Virologists have faced enormous challenges in trying to recruit newly infected people to participate in numerous experiments and clinical drug trials.
According to official data from independent sources, more than 90 thousand people are infected with the virus in the world today. About 80 thousand are residents of China. Comparison of Chinese statistics with WHO data indicates an artificial underestimation of infection and incidence rates in China by at least 2 times. These are big and significant numbers. Behind them are the lives of people.
What does it indicate
Relax early. The external positiveness demonstrated by China does not really fit in with the further measures taken by the country's authorities.
Additional measures are being taken to counter the epidemic. Among those announced are the construction of 10 (ten!) New hospitals in Wuhan and the recruitment of new medical staff to work in the epidemic zone, who were promised children to go to school without waiting in line and "coffin" money for the family.
If, as the statistics say, the epidemic is on the decline, why do we need ten new "plague hut" hospitals? Who are they going to treat?
According to a number of foreign media, the hastily erected hospital buildings are actually not equipped with medical equipment. They do not have normal intensive care units or intensive care units. In essence, these are hospices for tens of thousands of Chinese. People are brought here to die.
Why China is hiding the true extent of the coronavirus
China began to hide information about the coronavirus from the very beginning of the epidemic. Consider Dr. Lee. He died on February 7, 2020. The doctor was the first to try to warn the world about the threat of the coronavirus - and who the gallant Chinese government tried to silence. A week before his death, on January 29, the Chinese Supreme Court ruled that the police warned Dr. Li wrongfully and did nothing illegal.
The silence on the scale of the tragedy can be explained by several reasons. China is a closed state with a totalitarian regime. Therefore, any information is carefully filtered. The country was not ready for the tragedy. Medical services, government, residents were not ready.
- China is hiding about the virus. Throughout December 2019, despite the increase in pneumonia and deaths, the very possibility of an epidemic was rejected. All over China, including Wuhan, there are mass and entertainment events. Only on January 10 was a full-fledged test to identify the pathogen. It turned out to be not Sars, as Dr. Lee had supposed, but a new, unfamiliar virus.
- China is hiding the epidemic. Until mid-January, case numbers were based solely on laboratory-confirmed cases. But there are not enough laboratories and tests, and therefore in Wuhan it was decided to make a diagnosis not on the basis of tests, but on the basis of a clinical picture and a lung scan. Nearly 15 thousand new cases are those who have a relatively simple, literally by eye, examination revealed viral pneumonia.
- One of the reasons why China not only abandoned the test, but decided to “expand and supplement” it, is that the test does surprisingly poorly. Theoretically, a genetic test should be extremely accurate, but what is used in China gives a huge number of false negatives. The infamous Dr. Li is known to have had six negative results before the lab eventually confirmed the diagnosis.
- China trades with the whole world. It is the leader in the export of everything from the Ali Express website to food, technology, drug substances. The state trades with most countries of 5 continents. Attempts to hide the real scale of the epidemic is an economic benefit, an opportunity to save the country's economy.
Expert opinion
According to ICL experts, there are more patients radically, at times or even orders of magnitude. The peak of the epidemic in Wuhan itself will be passed only by the end of this month, in the rest of mainland China in a month and a half.
Whether China can handle the epidemic is still a big question mark.
WHO Director-General Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus noted that despite the huge number of cases, with a population of 6.3 billion people, the outbreak has not yet reached epidemic levels. Any scenario is possible.
What conclusion can be drawn from all of the above? The pandemic is in full swing. China is lowering the number of cases and deaths by several times in order to save its economy. The virus is attacking Europe. The most reasonable thing to do in this situation is to avoid crowded places and temporarily stop traveling.