China is ground zero for a pandemic – 2017 article alerts us to Coronavirus
In November 2017, Smithsonian magazine article published the article “Is China Ground Zero for a Future Pandemic?” Usually I’d to defer Betteridge’s law of headlines, an adage that states: “Any headline that ends in a question mark can be answered by the word no.” But let’s see what we were told:
At least two flu pandemics in the past century—in 1957 and 1968—originated in the Middle Kingdom and were triggered by avian viruses that evolved to become easily transmissible between humans. Although health authorities have increasingly tried to ban the practice, millions of live birds are still kept, sold and slaughtered in crowded markets each year. In a study published in January, researchers in China concluded that these markets were a “main source of H7N9 transmission by way of human-poultry contact and avian-related environmental exposures”…
China is uniquely positioned to create a novel flu virus that kills people. On Chinese farms, people, poultry and other livestock often live in close proximity. Pigs can be infected by both bird flu and human flu viruses, becoming potent “mixing vessels” that allow genetic material from each to combine and possibly form new and deadly strains. The public’s taste for freshly killed meat, and the conditions at live markets, create ample opportunity for humans to come in contact with these new mutations….
Despite such shortcomings, Western experts say Chinese officials have come a long way since their wobbly handling of the 2002 outbreak of SARS, the severe respiratory disease caused by a previously unknown coronavirus; Chinese apparatchiks initially tried to cover up the epidemic, creating a worldwide scandal.
Do we trust China over coronavirus?
Posted: 6th, April 2020 | In: News Comment | TrackBack | Permalink
