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Lack of immunity means China is vulnerable to another wave of coronavirus, chief adviser warns

2020-05-17T17:41:20.817Z


China still faces the “great challenge” of a possible second wave of covid-19 infections, warned the country's top respiratory authority, and the lack of immunity among the community…


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China launches "10-day battle" against covid-19 1:02

(CNN) - China still faces the “big challenge” of a possible second wave of covid-19 infections, the country's top respiratory authority warned, and the lack of immunity among the community is a serious concern as the race continues. for developing a vaccine.

Dr. Zhong Nanshan, chief medical adviser to the Chinese government and the public image of the country's fight against covid-19, also confirmed in an exclusive interview with CNN on Saturday that local authorities in Wuhan, the city where reported by The first time the new coronavirus in December suppressed key details about the magnitude of the initial outbreak.

China has reported more than 82,000 coronavirus cases, with at least 4,633 deaths, according to data from the country's National Health Commission (NHC). The number of new infections rose rapidly in late January, causing cities to close and travel bans across the country.

In early February, China reported up to 3,887 new cases per day. However, a month later, daily cases dropped to double digits, while in the US, the number of daily infections shot up, from 47 new cases on March 6 to 22,562 at the end of the month.

Having largely contained the virus so far, life in China is slowly returning to normal. The restrictions have eased and some schools and factories have reopened across the country.

Authorities in Wuhan have ordered massive tests of Covid-19 for the 11 million residents after a new group of cases emerged earlier this month.

But Zhong says the Chinese authorities should not be complacent about the danger of a second wave of infections looming. New clusters of coronavirus cases have emerged in China in recent weeks, in Wuhan and in the northeast provinces of Heilongjiang and Jilin.

"Most ... the Chinese are still susceptible to covid-19 infection at this time, due to lack of immunity," Zhong said. "We are facing a great challenge, we are not better than foreign countries at the moment."

"They did not like to tell the truth"

Zhong is known as the "SARS hero" in China for fighting the severe epidemic of acute respiratory syndrome in 2003. This time, he has led the coronavirus response, especially in the critical early stages of the outbreak.

On January 20, it was Zhong who confirmed on the state-owned CCTV network that coronavirus can be transmitted between people, after Wuhan health authorities maintained for weeks that there was no clear evidence of person-to-person transmission, and that the outbreak was "preventable and controllable".

Leading a team of experts dispatched by the NHC to investigate the initial outbreak, Zhong visited Wuhan on January 18. He said that upon arrival he received many calls from doctors and alumni, warning him that the situation was much worse than reported in official reports.

"Local authorities did not like to tell the truth at the time," Zhong said.

"At first they were silent, and then I said we probably had a (higher) number of people infected."

Zhong says he became suspicious when the number of officially reported cases in Wuhan remained at 41 for more than 10 days, despite infections that arose abroad.

"I didn't believe in that result, so (I kept) asking and then, they have to give me the real number," he said. "I suppose they are very reluctant to answer my question."

Zhong Nanshan speaks at a press conference in Beijing on January 20.

In Beijing two days later, on January 20, he was told that the total number of cases in Wuhan was now 198, with three people dead and 13 infected medical workers.

In a meeting with central government officials, including Chinese Prime Minister Li Keqiang, that same day, he proposed locking up Wuhan to contain the spread of the virus.

The move was unprecedented. The central government locked Wuhan on January 23, canceling all flights, trains, and buses in and out of the city, and blocking major highway entrances.

Wuhan's blockade was finally lifted 76 days later.

In an interview with CCTV on January 27, Wuhan Mayor Zhou Xianwang admitted that his government did not disclose information about the coronavirus to the public "in a timely manner", saying that "as a local government, we can only disclose information after being authorized".

China fired several senior officials in February amid widespread criticism of the authorities' handling of the outbreak. They included the two officials in charge of the provincial health commission, as well as the heads of the Chinese communist party in Wuhan and Hubei province, according to China's state news agency Xinhua.

A woman in a face mask rests on a bicycle along the eastern lake in Wuhan after her closure is lifted.

Lessons learned from SARS

While Zhong acknowledged that the number of infections was not initially reported in Wuhan, he rejected allegations that China's official statistics remained unreliable even after the central government took control of the country's coronavirus response in late April. January.

With the number of coronavirus deaths exceeding 87,000 in the U.S., President Donald Trump has publicly questioned the accuracy of the death toll in China.

But Zhong said the Chinese government learned SARS lessons 17 years ago, when it covered up "part of the outbreak ... for two to three months."

This time, he said, the central government announced that "all cities, all government departments, should report the true number of diseases, so if you don't, you will be punished."

"So, since ... on January 23, I think all the data ... is correct," he added.

Migrant workers in face masks wait outside the train station in Guangzhou, China, before returning home during the 2003 SARS outbreak.

Zhong said he is surprised by the number of infections and deaths in the United States, adding that he felt some Western governments did not take the threat of the coronavirus seriously at the start of the outbreak.

"I think in some of the countries of Europe, or perhaps in the United States, (governments) assume that this type of disease ... is more or less like the flu, and that is wrong," he said.

Zhong also rejected the theory put forward by Trump and United States Secretary of State Mike Pompeo that the virus originated in a laboratory in Wuhan.

He said he repeatedly asked Shi Zhengli, chief virologist at the Wuhan Institute of Virology, the center of the Trump administration's allegations, about claims that the virus was created in his laboratory and accidentally leaked.

"She said that was totally ridiculous, she had never been doing something like this," said Zhong, who called Shi a "good friend."

"He said that based on their equipment and facilities and labor ... they couldn't do anything, no artificial viruses at the time."

Zhong said that in early February, China's disease control authorities spent two weeks investigating Shi's laboratory for irregularities. They found nothing, he added.

Searching for a vaccine

With thousands of new coronavirus cases still being reported worldwide every day, and more than 300,000 deaths since the pandemic began, researchers are struggling to develop a vaccine.

Three American companies are already testing their vaccines in humans, according to the World Health Organization. They are still in phase 1 or phase 2 trials, which generally involve giving the vaccine to dozens or hundreds of study subjects.

Zhong said three Chinese vaccines are in clinical trials in the country, however, a "perfect" solution would likely be "years" away.

"We have to try again and again and again ... by using different types of vaccines. It is too early to draw a conclusion on what type of vaccine is available for this type of coronavirus… that is why I consider that the final approval of the vaccine (will take) much longer ”, he concluded.

China

Source: cnnespanol

All news articles on 2020-05-17

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