WHO in Wuhan: Racism and a whole lot of "Duh!"

[Prometheus]

Here's an article by Joshua Zitser. Here's a bit from his bio on businessinsider.com:

Joshua has an MA in Politics from the University of Edinburgh and an MA in Broadcast Journalism from City, University of London. He also spent time at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

...

Expertise

Donald Trump, QAnon, Israel, Palestine, TikTok, Twitter, radicalization, extremism.

I just want it to be clear that the following article was not written by a right-wing conspiracy theorist. This guy is so left-wing that he thinks watching TikTok videos is an "expertise."

Here we go:

Wuhan's COVID-19 outbreak probably 500% bigger than first thought, WHO team tells CNN

Right off the bat, I see the subtle racism the media is prone to: playing with the numbers. He could have said, "5x bigger" but that doesn't really convey the right level of outrage that people should feel about China or the Chinese, does it? Why use a small number when you can use a bigger number that means the same thing but will most likely be misinterpreted by the average reader?

How much do you want to bet that there are people out there saying that the Wuhan outbreak was "500 TIMES bigger" after a cursory glance at the headline? Some of them are saying it because they didn't see the percent sign and some are doing it because they don't understand what the percent sign means and they assume it's the same as "times."

The author doesn't want readers to hate the Chinese a paltry 5 times more than they already do. He wants them to hate the Chinese 500 times more.

It's a lie based on the fact that such a well-educated author KNOWS how bad the public school system is.

Moving on...

Investigators from the World Health Organization (WHO) have found signs that the coronavirus outbreak in Wuhan in December 2019 might have been more widespread than initially thought, according to CNN.

"The virus was circulating widely in Wuhan in December, which is a new finding," lead investigator Peter Ben Embarek told the media outlet.

Chinese scientists told the WHO team that around 174 cases of COVID-19 in and around Wuhan in December, CNN's Nick Paton Walsh reported.

WHO's investigation suggests that there might actually have been over 1,000 infections during that month, CNN said.

This is where the author dodges the "lie" by providing actual numbers which he knows his readers probably won't notice... or care about.

He also adds in another complete lie: "The virus was circulating widely in Wuhan in December, which is a new finding,"

It's not new... at least not to those of us living in China at the time. I've mentioned it on several boards and I'll repeat it here:

The news media in China was reporting on a "mysterious pneumonia" killing old people in Wuhan way back in November of 2019. December is simply when the whistle got blown and the news media was forced to clam up.

I need to make a few points here:

1. If enough people were already dying in November to make it to the news then the virus was in circulation for at least 1 to 2 months prior. That's kind of obvious. For a WHO investigator to act surprised about it means he's an idiot or the WHO was complicit early on. I don't mean to get all CT on the issue, but it's kind of obvious.

2. If the virus was in the wild as early as even September, then it was absolutely already in other countries and killing people in those places too. Airplanes, dontcha know? They didn't identify it as a deadly new strain of virus either making the "China covered up the seriousness of the virus" theory a bunch of bullshit. A few old people dying of pneumonia really isn't a "red flag."

3. If I knew about it in November, then the US intelligence apparatus knew about it in November. Even if they didn't think it was a huge problem, the gag on the news and social media outlets should have made it obvious since the "gag" actually made it to western news outlets. And people still thought of it as a "Chinese problem" since everyone in the world seemed to (all at the same time) forget that airplanes exist.

4. Once the news was out in December, why did it take so long for other countries to react? Oh yeah. They forgot about the airplanes.

Like I said: A whole lot of "Duh!"

Embarek told CNN that because the number presented by Chinese scientists were likely severe cases, it is unlikely that 174 cases reflect the true number of December infections.

"We have done any modeling of that since, but we know... in ballpark figures... out of the infected population, about 15% end up in severe cases, and the vast majority are mild cases," Embarek said.

This estimate suggests that there would have been at least 1,100 cases of COVID-19 in Wuhan in the final month of 2019.

To the "we must hate the Chinese" crowd, this is evidence that the Chinese had been hiding the virus and its severity.

Let's not discuss the fact that there was no definitive and widely available test at that time (in any country). Let's just heap ire on those damn commie bastards!

The WHO team also discovered that there were numerous strains of COVID-19 already spreading across the city in December, according to CNN.

WHO scientists identified 13 different genetic sequences of the virus from that month during their investigation, the media outlet reported.

Changes in genetic sequencing are usual and take place over time as viruses spread and reproduce.

The discovery of over a dozen genetic sequences of the SARS-COV-2 virus from December, however, might suggest that the coronavirus was circulating earlier than initially thought.

Prof. Edward Holmes, a virologist at the University of Sydney, told CNN: "As there was already genetic diversity in SARS-CoV-2 sequences sampled from Wuhan in December 2019, it is likely that the virus was circulating for a while longer than that month alone."

Again, a whole lot of "Duh!" even to those of us without formal training in epidemiology.

OK. That's not quite fair. Rational, intelligent people with no formal training in epidemiology know that's a whole lot of "Duh!"

Embarek declined to reach that conclusion this early on.

This discovery is the latest addition to the growing body of evidence that suggests COVID-19 may have been spreading globally before December.

One analysis by Harvard University, based on Wuhan hospitals' satellite images and search engine traffic for coronavirus symptoms, suggests that the virus may have started circulating there as early as late summer.

Another study from Milan's National Cancer Institute suggests that COVID-19 cases may have been found in Italy in October 2019.

Wuhan's public health officials told the WHO about the illness on December 31, 2019.

But government records show China's first coronavirus case happened on November 17, 2019, according to an investigation by the South China Morning Post.

More "Duh!" but still no remarks about how anyone was supposed to even recognize it was a pandemic, just a lot about China being investigated and no supposition that the cases in Italy may have been the first. They must have done some tracking to see if those Italian cases had links to China, right? Why not say so?

Because it doesn't fit the "blame China" agenda.

I guarantee you that as soon as the scope of the epidemic was known by Chinese leadership that they absolutely knew that they were going to take the blame no matter what so they just decided to save whatever face they could by enforcing the gag, prepping plans for lock-downs, and making plans to obfuscate to the WHO and the rest of the world.

And everywhere else, people hurled insults at the Chinese; forgot airplanes existed; made jokes; called it a hoax; and stocked up on 5 years worth of toilet paper just in case.

And thus ends my Monday morning rant.