Sensible Precautions by China

If China was as "sensible" as you claim Gagajo they would have done something about their toxic air quality long before it caused their population to have to wear permanent face masks to avoid breathing in poisoned air. China has one of the worst mortality rates in the world because of air pollution, something in the region of 1.5 million premature deaths are attributed to it. Since the Coronavirus lockdown, its estimated that as many as 75,000 lives have been saved from premature death because their quality has improved.

As for racists comments, well, you'd be better asking the 1,000,000 Chinese Muslim Uighurs currently in detention for "retraining" what they think of that.

I think there will be a handful, yes. JUST because we are the most at risk group. Yes, there are some very spry, healthy individuals here. But I think if you looked at us as a group, many of us are at risk for reasons other than just our age.

Plus, I read what craftyone explained a couple of weeks ago, about the depletion of T cells, and how this means older people have less defence against the virus.

Some of us, unfortunately, are going to cark it.

Chewbacca, much as I love a discussion, I'm not bothering with it ATM.

I'm talking about how they are defeating the CV. Nothing else. You bang on about other stuff if you want. I'm not interested.

It’s easy to enforce rules at the point of a gun.

If it stops me dying from the virus, I'll take it.

Inconvenient things facts aren't they?

MY POINT was that my ex student wrote her own report of the precautions that are being taken, that she experienced as she entered China. The precautions are admirable. If you're so blinded by your desire to be right that you can't see that, I feel sorry for you.

There is a European example of a town in Italy that also managed to stop the virus. Maybe that is an acceptable example for you, given that it is in Europe, in an area that you possibly DO regard as civilised? Aggressive action works. The UK COULD take this approach. It would save millions of lives. It isn't doing it.

www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/mar/20/eradicated-coronavirus-mass-testing-covid-19-italy-vo

Perhaps, just perhaps, if the Chinese government had listened to Li Wenlian last December, when he warned them about them about the virus, instead of threatening him with imprisonment for spreading rumours, the rest of the world wouldn't be in the state it's in now.

Even now, the charges against him haven't gone as far as exonerating him. So if any one has a moral responsibility to try and stop this vile pandemic from spreading further it's the Chinese government.

I give up debating with you CB. You see it as an academic argument to win. I'm frustrated with the reality of the UK's unwillingness to act. We have two incompatible POV's.

Gagajo I am not sure you are the only Gransnetter with links to China, but.......however you dress this up it is their fault wether it is someone batshit crazy who thinks it’s ok to purchase live bats and eat them or........the Bio/Chemistry laboratory that just happens to be located at the epicentre if the outbreak??
However you dress it up China caused this and in the future they should be prepared to pay!!

This virus has been around for longer than they claim.

SueDonim has put it succinctly - if they had listened to Dr Li Wenliang in the first place instead of treating him in the abominable way they did, the world may not be in the chaos it is now.
And he is not the only whistleblower who has died or 'disappeared'.

You may have friends there, GagaJo - are they ex-pats or poor Chinese nationals?
Quite a difference to how they may be treated.

What ridiculous comments by some on this thread!

Just because China has abhorrent attitudes towards animals (it does) and an authoritarian attitude towards freedom of information (it does) doesn't mean that the UK and other countries can't learn from the measures which have now been put in place in China to try and curb the spread of Covid-19.

British exceptionalism isn't something viruses recognise.

My friends are all average Chinese people. They’re not poor but not from the Chinese elite/wealthy class either. They live in a very similar way to the way you and I live. Family, friends, pets. They have an extended family lifestyle and value education much more than in the West. Older people are shown a lot of respect and are able to retire earlier than in the West. Often at 50. They all speak good English and until this year, travelled a lot. Europe, South America. They mostly use VPNs to bypass the great firewall and are up to date with international news. They’re mostly happy with their government and view the West’s politics as chaotic.

I can only speak personally, but I loathe the ex pat lifestyle. I don’t live overseas to spend all my time with Westerners. My friend from Wuhan is my best friend and a surrogate daughter. I’ve found the Chinese to be almost universally warm and friendly.

www.yenisafak.com/en/video-gallery/Hayvanlar%20Alemi/snakes-dogs-and-bats-inside-a-chinese-animal-market-2203281

Yes, Hetty, nobody's denying that the live animal markets have been the source of infection and most Westerners would agree that they're morally abhorrent too.

One of my students is Chinese and I was talking to her parents about attitudes to animals in China. Her father originally came from a poor area of China. I was surprised when he told me that people in poor areas usually don't eat beef. Good quality beef is obviously expensive and a greedy use of resources, but the main reason is that the people regard cattle as allies in the field, in much the same way as people treat horses.

I understand the live animal market in Wuhan has been shut down. Hopefully, the Chinese will enforce live animal bans more strictly in the future and the message will get out to people that food hygiene is more important. Overcoming cultural traditions is hard, but the authoritarian nature of the Chinese government could do it much more easily than Western liberal tradition.

None of this negates the fact that other countries could learn from the measures which are being taken in China. This is no time for petty jingoism.

Sensible Precautions by China
Followed by photos of a poor little lad with he virus and his anxious mother.
I think most on here acknowledge what we need to do.

However, did you not say that you had just flown home from Switzerland, GagaJo, where there are more cases per capita than the UK then went straight home and cuddled your little DGS?

When I read that on another thread I shuddered.
I know that children seem to be immune from the virus but your own OP has just proved otherwise.

To avoid confusion, I should make it clear that the photos of the sick child were on another thread started by you.

Callistemon, you're right. I flew home a week ago. It WAS a risk. I've said that on here several times. No two ways about it, it was dangerous. At the time I flew, the village my school is on the edge of had 4 cases. BUT I know there would have been many more undiagnosed ones.

Not sure how it is relevant to this thread, or if it was you that has pointed out the risk to me before (like I wasn't AWARE of the risk). It was dangerous. But I talked to my daughter about it first and we decided together that I'd come back.

IF I had had the option of the conditions imposed by China, I would have leapt at them. Testing? Great! Isolation for 2 weeks prior to going home? Perfect!

We should be doing FAR more than we currently are as a country. WHY aren't our NHS staff being issued hazmat suits? (None available apparently). WHY aren't be legally obliged to be in proper lockdown?

THAT is the point of this thread. WHY is a country most of you clearly regard as being backward able to be so advanced when it comes to preventing recurrence when we can't even protect our NHS staff with proper clothing for the job?

I posted on the wrong thread GagaJo, it should have been on your other thread with the pictures of the sick child. I must admit I felt a sense of shock when I read you had come off a plane from overseas where there is the virus and went straight home to cuddle your DGS without self-isolating.
Then started a thread telling us all to be careful.

China may be taking sensible precautions now but rather late don't you think?

They let the genie out of the bottle months ago.

I do know just a tad about China
A country of dichotomy

Gagajo if we had been in proper lockdown you might still be in Switzerland.

I had nowhere to self isolate Callistemon. I WAS going to stay at my blokes but he is refusing to isolate and his daughter was supposed to come home to his. She would be out, daily. My daughter/grandson live in my house. 1 bathroom. I couldn't stay at school. The school closed. I talked to my daughter about it and we decided together.

China screwed up hugely in the beginning. BUT they've been on it for months. WHY oh WHY didn't WE see their example and prepare?

We are about to be where Italy are now. Except our doctors and nurses don't even have proper face masks.

France on the news 1 minute ago:

People in the streets shopping in the markets, buying fresh produce. Social distancing supposedly enforced by the gendarmes.

As the reporter is telling us this, one woman stops to speak to another woman, heads close together. 2nd woman moves on down the street, 1st woman coughs and coughs into the collar of her coat.

Callistemon China may be taking sensible precautions now but rather late don't you think?
I am not just angry but furious, not just furious but incandescent with rage over the lack of planning for this.

We have known for decades that one day there would be a pandemic. The World Health Organisation along with all countries should have planned for this and had a strategy in place.

The strategy is obvious. If a new virus starts circulating then the country should immediately sever all links with the outside world other than goods in and out. No-one allowed to enter or leave. If people must return to their own country then they are immediately put into quarantine on arrival, whatever country that is, with no exceptions.

Other countries then send staff, medical equipment and whatever else required to help eliminate the virus. Once the virus is eliminated things resume to normal and that country is open again for business.

To me, just a normal person with no medical knowledge, that seems pretty obvious, so why didn't these so called experts plan for this years ago?

Because of their failure to do this we are seeing a global pandemic and untold suffering for all countries which has hardly even begun yet. Plus an economic breakdown which has yet to reveal its true extent.

Angry doesn't even begin to describe how I feel.

Chestnut ditto!!