Chindia Alert: You’ll be Living in their World Very Soon
aims to alert you to the threats and opportunities that China and India present. China and India require serious attention; case of ‘hidden dragon and crouching tiger’.
Without this attention, governments, businesses and, indeed, individuals may find themselves at a great disadvantage sooner rather than later.
The POSTs (front webpages) are mainly 'cuttings' from reliable sources, updated continuously.
The PAGEs (see Tabs, above) attempt to make the information more meaningful by putting some structure to the information we have researched and assembled since 2006.
LONDON/BEIJING (Reuters) – The world’s wealthiest nations poured unprecedented aid into the traumatized global economy on Thursday as coronavirus cases ballooned in the current epicentre Europe even as they waned at the pandemic’s point of origin, China.
With almost 219,000 infections and more than 8,900 deaths so far, the epidemic has stunned the world and drawn comparisons with painful periods such as World War Two, the 2008 financial crisis and the 1918 Spanish flu.
“This is like an Egyptian plague,” said Argentinian hotelier Patricia Duran, who has seen bookings dry up for her two establishments near the famous Iguazu Falls.
“The hotels are empty – tourist activity has died.”
RELATED COVERAGE
Factbox: Latest on the spread of coronavirus around the world
What you need to know about the coronavirus right now
Tourism and airlines have been particularly battered, as the world’s citizens hunker down to minimize contact and curb the spread of the flu-like COVID-19. But few sectors have been spared by a crisis threatening lengthy global recession.
On markets, investors have dumped assets everywhere, many switching to U.S. dollars as a safe haven. Other currencies hit historic lows, with Britain’s pound near its weakest since 1985.
Policymakers in the United States, Europe and Asia have slashed interest rates and opened liquidity taps to try to stabilise economies hit by quarantined consumers, broken supply chains, disrupted transport and paralysed businesses.
The virus, thought to have originated from wildlife on mainland China late last year, has jumped to 172 other nations and territories with more than 20,000 new cases reported in the past 24 hours – a new daily record.
Cases in Germany, Iran and Spain rose to over 12,000 each. An official in Tehran tweeted that the coronavirus was killing one person every 10 minutes.
LONDON LOCKDOWN?
Britain, which had sought to take a gradual approach to containment, was closing dozens of underground stations in London and ordering schools shut from Friday.
Some 20,000 military personnel were on standby to help and Queen Elizabeth was due to leave Buckingham Palace in the capital for her ancient castle at Windsor. Britain has reported 104 deaths and 2,626 cases, but scientific advisers say the real number of infections may be more than 50,000.
Italian soldiers transported corpses overnight from an overwhelmed cemetery in Europe’s worst-hit nation where nearly 3,000 people have died. Germany’s military was also readying to help despite national sensitivities over its deployment dating back to the Nazi era.
Supermarkets in many countries were besieged with shoppers stocking up on food staples and hygiene products. Some rationed sales and fixed special hours for the elderly.
Solidarity projects were springing up in some of the world’s poorest corners. In Kenya’s Kibera slum, for example, volunteers with plastic drums and boxes of soap on motorbikes set up handwashing stations for people without clean water.
Russia reported its first coronavirus death on Thursday.
Amid the gloom, China provided a ray of hope, as it reported zero new local transmissions in a thumbs-up for its draconian containment policies since January. Imported cases, however, surged, accounting for all 34 new infections.
The United States, where President Donald Trump had initially played down the coronavirus threat, saw infections close in on 8,000 and deaths reach at least 151.
Trump has infuriated Beijing’s communist government by rebuking it for not acting faster and drawn accusations of racism by referring to the “Chinese virus”.
“EXTRAORDINARY TIMES”
In a bewildering raft of financial measures around the world, the European Central Bank launched new bond purchases worth 750 billion euros ($817 billion). That brought some relief to bond markets and also halted European shares’ slide, though equities remained shaky elsewhere.
“Extraordinary times require extraordinary action,” ECB President Christine Lagarde said, amid concerns that the strains could tear apart the euro zone as a single currency bloc.
The U.S. Federal Reserve rolled out its third emergency credit programme in two days, aimed at keeping the $3.8 trillion money market mutual fund industry functioning.
China was to unleash trillions of yuan of fiscal stimulus and South Korea pledged 50 trillion won ($39 billion).
The desperate state of industry was writ large in Detroit, where the big three automakers – Ford Motor Co (F.N), General Motors Co (GM.N) and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV (FCHA.MI) (FCAU.N) – were shutting U.S. plants, as well as factories in Canada and Mexico.
With some economists fearing prolonged pain akin to the 1930s Great Depression but others anticipating a post-virus bounceback, gloomy data and forecasts abounded.
In one of the most dire calls, J.P. Morgan economists forecast the Chinese economy to drop more than 40% this quarter and the U.S. economy to shrink 14% in the next.
There was a backlash against conspiracy theories and rumours circulating on social media, with Morocco arresting a woman who denied the disease existed.
And in Brazil, where President Jair Bolsonaro initially labelled the virus “a fantasy”, more members of the political elite fell ill. At night, housebound protesters banged pots and pans, shouting “Bolsonaro out!” from their windows.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption Small groups of young people can be seen playing sports as schools, colleges and even gyms are shut.
Life in India has changed dramatically as the world’s second-most populous country grapples with the coronavirus outbreak.
Otherwise crowded and chaotic cities have quietened down as people stay home, traffic slows and even weddings shrink in size and scale.
India has confirmed 151 active cases and three deaths – but public health experts fear that the low count is the result of limited testing and under-reporting. The country has only conducted about 12,000 tests so far, partly because of a shortage of testing kits.
So it’s still unclear if and to what extent community transmission exists in India – community transmission means a patient had no known contact with another confirmed case or travelled from a country badly affected by the pandemic.
However, India’s central government, several state governments and city administrations have already responded with drastic measures.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
The Indira Gandhi international airport in the national capital Delhi, is the country’s busiest airport but it appears deserted nowadays.
India has barred entry to everyone, including citizens, flying from certain countries, including the UK and most European nations. It has also cancelled most entry visas to people (excluding citizens) flying in from other countries.
This has led to numerous flight cancellations.
Airlines are also struggling as fewer people are flying even within India, wary that new regulations could see them stranded away from their homes. Two of India’s top airlines are reportedly considering grounding planes amid plummeting demand for flights.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
Popular Indian monuments – such as the 16th Century Red Fort in Delhi – have been shut to visitors to prevent large gatherings.
Taj Mahal, the country’s most iconic monument, closed its doors on Tuesday, along with more than 140 other monuments and museums.
With fewer people visiting and closures of public places likely to go up, tourism is expected to take a huge hit across India – the Taj alone draws as many as 70,000 people a day.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
Bangalore, an IT hub in southern India, is among the major cities that has shut down its malls – such as the one above – and schools, colleges, cinema halls and other public places have been closed since late last week. Other major cities such as Delhi, the financial hub Mumbai and Hyderabad in the south, have done the same.
City officials have also imposed restrictions on large gatherings such as weddings, cricket matches or any public ticketed events.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
Some of Delhi’s busiest spots, such as Connaught Place, are mostly empty.
There has also been a significant drop in the number of people using trains, which remain the most popular form of transport in India.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
The service from Mumbai to Pune city – which takes about three to four hours – has seen about a 30% fall in passenger traffic, according to some estimates.
The western state of Maharashtra, where both cities are located, has reported the highest number of cases in India so far. The central railways has already cancelled 23 long distance trains going to and from Mumbai – officials say the reason is both the virus and the lower number of passengers.
Overall, more than 150 trains have been cancelled across India. This number could increase in coming days.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
Many holy sites, including the Golden Temple – one of the holiest shrines in Sikhism – remain open, although the footfall is much lower. It’s quite unusual to see such few people in what is one of India’s busiest shrines.
Tirumala Tirupati, the richest Hindu temple, has cancelled many of its daily rituals and is restricting the number of pilgrims for the first time.
Some major Hindu temples, such as the Siddhivinayak temple in the heart of Mumbai, and the Vaishno Devi cave shrine, have closed.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
City officials in Delhi have begun sanitising auto rickshaws and taxis to contain the spread of the virus.
Public transport poses a major challenge to containing the outbreak. But it continues to be used regularly across India, even as governments encourage people to stay home as much as possible.
But not all offices have work from home options, and this is especially a challenge for the millions who work in India’s informal sector – these include domestic help, street vendors and daily wage workers.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
Surprisingly, sit-in protests against India’s controversial new citizenship law continue in some cities, including Delhi and Bangalore.
The most prominent of these, pictured above, is happening in Delhi’s Shaheen Bagh neighbourhood. Thousands of protesters, mostly Muslim women, have been demonstrating against the law, which critics say is anti-Muslim, since December.
But Delhi has shut down schools, colleges, gyms, night clubs, spas and swimming pools – and Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal has said all social, political and religious gatherings with more than 50 people would be stopped.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
Temperature checks have become a common feature across cities – here, people are being screened before they enter the high court in the eastern city of Kolkata (formerly Calcutta).
This practice has been adopted at airports, corporate offices and several other places that remain open despite the restrictions.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGES
In the southern city of Hyderabad, students appeared for their school-leaving exams, but they came armed with masks.
Delhi, however, has postponed all school examinations.
Experts say India could impose more sweeping lockdowns as the toll climbs further.
‘What we are seeing here is reciprocity,’ the German leader says, referencing the EU’s aiding stricken China earlier this year
But critics dismissed China’s show of largesse as propaganda designed to deflect US claims that the contagion originated in China
The colours of the Italian flag are projected onto the Palazzo Senatorio building on Capitoline Hill in Rome on Tuesday as a “sign of hope in this difficult and delicate moment”, Rome’s mayor stated. Photo: AFP
German Chancellor Angela Merkel has downplayed concerns over China’s provision of medical supplies to European countries hit hardest by the Covid-19 pandemic, calling the move a gesture of reciprocity.
The European Union continued to face criticism over its slow reaction to calls for medical supplies from Italy and Spain, amid the encouraging news that new cases in Italy were seeing their slowest rate of increase since the contagion came to light in late February.
“The European Union sent medical equipment to China [when] China asked for help at that time,” Merkel said at a Tuesday press conference, referring to the outbreak’s start earlier this year. “What we are seeing here is reciprocity.”
“As we are having a crisis at this time, we cannot expect everything to be provided in the framework of the EU. We are very pleased about [China’s provision],” Merkel said.
Chinese President Xi Jinping has guaranteed that China will provide Italy and Spain – the two most severely hit European countries – with medical equipment such as face masks, ventilators and protective equipment for medical professionals.
Critics, however, called China’s action part of a propaganda campaign designed to deflect US claims that the coronavirus originated in China.
Spanish Prime Minister Pedro Sanchez reached out to Xi for help obtaining medical supplies in a phone call on Tuesday.
Speaking to reporters, Sanchez confirmed that the matter had come up during the call, just days after the Spanish government had ordered an unprecedented national lockdown to halt the virus’ spread.
Chinese state media reported that Xi had told Sanchez that “China is willing to respond to the urgent needs of Spain and spare no effort to provide support and assistance, and share experience in prevention, control and treatment.”
Workers loading boxes of surgical masks donated by China’s BYD, bound for the United States. Photo: Jack Ma Foundation
On Tuesday, a plane from Shanghai landed in the northern Spanish city of Zaragoza, carrying 500,000 masks donated by e-commerce giant Alibaba, AFP reported. (Alibaba owns the South China Morning Post.)
According to a statement, the delivery was part of a donation of 2 million masks and coronavirus test kits to certain countries from Alibaba’s Chinese billionaire founder Jack Ma.
Europe to shut border for month as France braces for 15-day coronavirus lockdown
17 Mar 2020
Xi’s call with Sanchez came a day after one with Italian Prime Minister Giuseppe Conte, in which the Chinese leader similarly pledged to provide Italy with medical support, including teams with expertise in treating Covid-19.
On Tuesday, Italy reported 345 new coronavirus deaths in 24 hours, taking its overall death toll to 2,503.
Spain registered 183 deaths, 53 per cent more than in the previous 24 hours, driving the total number of deaths to 524. More than 2,000 newly infected cases were reported, pushing the total to 11,681.
Elsewhere on Tuesday, France entered a national shutdown, while Belgium, where the EU is headquartered, announced a similar halt to public activities starting on Wednesday.
European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen said all 27 member states have agreed to ban non-EU citizens from visiting the region for the next 30 days. The method of enforcement will be determined by the individual countries, she said.
Company making front-runner appeals for people to take part in trial stage, which nine potential Chinese vaccines are set to enter in April
US trialling vaccine that copies virus’ genetic code, amid international search for a drug to help limit the outbreak’s human and economic impact
CanSino is recruiting healthy volunteers for a clinical trial of its vaccine candidate. Photo: Weibo
The race to develop a Covid-19 vaccine is on, with the United States already starting a clinical trial and China close behind.
On Tuesday, vaccine producer CanSino Biologics, in Tianjin in China’s northeast, said it was looking for volunteers to take part in a six-month clinical trial of a treatment it had developed jointly with the Academy of Military Medical Sciences.
“The vaccine does not contain infectious substances, is highly safe and stable, and requires only one inoculation,” the Hubei Centre for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) said in its request for volunteers.
Its announcement came a day after the first participant began a phase I trial for an experimental vaccine funded by the US National Institutes of Health and developed by biotech startup Moderna.
Chinese scientists identify two major types of the new coronavirus in preliminary study
It uses messenger ribonucleic acid (mRNA) technology that copies the genetic code of the virus instead of the actual virus. To date, no mRNA vaccine has been approved for humans.
China’s own mRNA vaccine candidate, jointly developed by the Chinese Centre for Disease Control and Prevention, Tongji University and Stermina in Shanghai, is undergoing animal trials and is expected to enter the clinical phrase in mid-April.
Developed by the CanSino and the Academy of Military Medical Sciences, the vaccine is the front-runner of nine that China is developing. All are in the process of completing preclinical trial studies and will enter clinical trials in April, with some expected to advance faster than others, according to Wang Junzhi, a biological products quality control expert and academician with the Chinese Academy of Sciences.
US Covid-19 testing accelerates as companies step in where government failed
18 Mar 2020
“China’s research and development of a vaccine for the coronavirus is, generally speaking, among the most advanced in the world,” Wang said at a press briefing in Beijing on Tuesday. “[We] will not be slower than other countries.”
Coronavirus: Scientists dismiss claim that humans engineered the deadly contagion
Hopes have been pinned on developing a vaccine, especially for vulnerable groups such as the elderly, in the face of an epidemic with no known cure that has brought the world to a partial standstill.
Scientists around the world are conducting experiments, and the US is reported to have tried to buy a Germany vaccine developer so that it would supply to the US only – with the German government reportedly offering its own financial incentives for the biopharmaceutical company concerned, CureVac, to stay in the country.
“A vaccine is the most effective medical means for epidemic prevention and control as it can effectively stop the spread of the virus,” Lei Chaozi, director of science and technology at China’s Ministry of Education, said.
“Vaccines also play an important part in … stabilising the economy and enabling the country to return to normal as work and production resume.”
Why did a ‘cured’ coronavirus patient die in China? His widow wants answers
7 Mar 2020
President Xi Jinping called for faster development of coronavirus vaccines and treatment drugs when he inspected the Academy of Military Medical Sciences two weeks ago.
About 1,000 Chinese scientists have been working on the push for vaccines, with nine vaccines developed through five different approaches, including an inactivated vaccine, a viral vector-based vaccine and a gene vaccine.
Wang said that the vaccines needed to satisfy strictly the relevant regulations and technical standards – as well as World Health Organisation requirements – before starting clinical trials.
The potential vaccine developed by CanSino and military researchers, led by virologist Chen Wei, is genetically engineered. “Spikes” on the surface of the coronavirus bind to human cells and enable the virus to invade the human cells, causing the sometimes fatal infection known as Covid-19. In theory, vaccines can rehearse such an attack and trigger the human body to be primed to respond to a real infection.
CanSino has submitted the pre-investigational new drug review application for the Ad5-nCoV vaccine to Chinese regulatory authorities, and is in the process of submitting the related technical documents.
According to the Hubei CDC, volunteers for the trial must be 18 to 60 years old with no history of coronavirus infection.
China has effectively expelled journalists from three US newspapers in retaliation for restrictions on its news outlets in the US.
Its foreign ministry ordered reporters from the New York Times, the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal to return media passes within 10 days.
The ministry also demanded information about their operations in China.
The measures were in response to “unwarranted restrictions on Chinese media agencies” in the US, it said.
China’s action also prohibits the newspapers’ journalists from working in the semi-autonomous regions of Hong Kong and Macau, where there is greater press freedom than on the mainland.
Earlier this month, the Trump administration imposed limits on the number of Chinese citizens who could work as journalists in the US – the latest move in a tit-for-tat row over press freedoms.
“What the US has done is exclusively targeting Chinese media organisations, and hence driven by a Cold War mentality and ideological bias,” China’s foreign ministry said in a statement on Tuesday.
US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo urged Beijing to reconsider its decision, calling the move “unfortunate”.
“I regret China’s decision today to further foreclose the world’s ability to conduct the free press operations that, frankly, would be really good for the Chinese people in these incredibly challenging global times, where more information, more transparency are what will save lives,” Mr Pompeo said.
Great loss for Chinese journalism
Zhaoyin Feng, BBC Chinese
All foreign correspondents in China are required to renew their press credentials annually, which usually happens at the year end.
This means most American reporters of the three US major publications have an expiring visa and will need to leave China under the new rules. We don’t know the exact number of affected journalists yet, but it’s believed to be close to a dozen.
The expulsions will lead to a major personnel loss in these three media organisations’ China operation, especially for the Wall Street Journal, which had already seen three reporters expelled from China last month.
Critics say it’s an even greater loss for China, as the draconian measures come at a time when the country and the rest of the world need high-quality journalism on China more than ever.
It’s still unclear whether the US publications can send new correspondents, American citizens or not, to fill in the positions in China.
In the midst of a dangerous pandemic, the world’s two superpowers are locked in an escalating war with multiple fronts. By fighting over media, the origin of the coronavirus, and technology and trade, the US and China are competing to prove the superiority of their own political model.
At the beginning of March, the US state department said five media outlets, including China’s official news agency Xinhua, would be required to reduce their total number of staff to 100 from 160.
The move was seen as retaliation for China’s expulsion of two US journalists for the Wall Street Journal over a coronavirus editorial in February.
The row over media access is the latest episode in an increasingly acrimonious dispute between China and the US.
Disagreements over trade, intellectual property rights and 5G networks have damaged relations in recent years.
The coronavirus pandemic has been a source of tension too, with Washington and Beijing both accusing each other of spreading misinformation.
On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump angered China by referring to the coronavirus as “Chinese”.
A foreign ministry spokesman accused the US of stigmatising China, where the first cases of Covid-19 were recorded in the city of Wuhan in late 2019.
However, last week a Chinese foreign ministry spokesman shared a conspiracy theory, alleging the US Army had brought it to the region.
The unfounded accusation led Mr Pompeo to demand China stop spreading “disinformation” as it tried “to shift blame” for the outbreak.
BEIJING (Reuters) – China’s Tencent Holdings Ltd (0700.HK) said on Thursday the coronavirus drove 8 billion visits to its WeChat platform as users flocked to get “health codes” they need to show authorities in order to travel around the country.
Reporting slightly lower than expected fourth quarter profit on Wednesday, the gaming and social media giant said in a statement it did not expect the epidemic to have any significant impact on its financial position to date.
This is markedly different from many companies around the world which have downgraded earnings forecasts due to the virus.
It reported a 21.58 billion yuan (US$3.07 billion) profit for the three months through December. That compared with the 22.85 billion yuan average of 15 analyst estimates compiled by Refinitiv.
Revenue rose 25% to 105.8 billion yuan, versus the 102.9 billion yuan average estimate of 17 analysts. That marked Tencent’s fastest revenue growth since late 2018.
Tencent’s businesses are mainly online-only, positioning it uniquely against other tech giants such as Alibaba Group Holding Ltd (BABA.N) that focus on e-commerce and whose supply chains have been severely disrupted by the outbreak.
“Mobile games are one of the very few entertainment options during the coronavirus outbreak. Comparing the figures in early 2019, downloads of Tencent games increased by 10.4% year over year in this February, and revenue increased by 11.8%,” said analyst Nan Lu at researcher Sensor Tower.
Overall, downloads of all Tencent apps for this February grew 32.3% month-on-month and 42.9% year-on-year, she said.
VIDEO STREAMING
Tencent’s most popular games include Honour of Kings and Peacekeeper Elite. It also operates social media platform WeChat, a video streaming site and a news portal. Its services experienced a surge in traffic as China’s government urged millions of people to stay at home and away from crowded places, analysts said.
Well before the epidemic began in China in late December, prospects were already starting to look up for the company after an especially difficult 2018, when it endured a lengthy freeze in the regulatory approval of new games that wiped billions of dollars off its market value.
A weak point in the January-March quarter, however, will likely be advertising – which made up nearly 20% of revenue in the third quarter – as companies cut back spending amid concerns over the virus’ economic fallout, analysts said.
Shares in Tencent closed 4.5% lower on Wednesday. Tencent’s shares have fallen 11.1% so far this year as the coronavrius roiled global markets, versus a 21% decline in the Hang Seng index .HIS.
Subsidiary Tencent Music Entertainment Group (TME.N) on Tuesday said it would likely see “much softer” first-quarter revenue growth as the outbreak was impacting licensing and advertising revenue.
On the flip side, analyst Kevin Tam at Core Pacific-Yamaichi Securities in Hong Kong wrote in a research note that Tencent could see margin improvement “as a result of stringent control on marketing expenses and higher profitability from video advertising”.
Image copyright NATIONAL MUSEUM OF HEALTH AND MEDICINEImage caption The 1918 flu pandemic is believed to have infected a third of the population worldwide
All interest in living has ceased, Mahatma Gandhi, battling a vile flu in 1918, told a confidante at a retreat in the western Indian state of Gujarat.
The highly infectious Spanish flu had swept through the ashram in Gujarat where 48-year-old Gandhi was living, four years after he had returned from South Africa. He rested, stuck to a liquid diet during “this protracted and first long illness” of his life. When news of his illness spread, a local newspaper wrote: “Gandhi’s life does not belong to him – it belongs to India”.
Outside, the deadly flu, which slunk in through a ship of returning soldiers that docked in Bombay (now Mumbai) in June 1918, ravaged India. The disease, according to health inspector JS Turner, came “like a thief in the night, its onset rapid and insidious”. A second wave of the epidemic began in September in southern India and spread along the coastline.
The influenza killed between 17 and 18 million Indians, more than all the casualties in World War One. India bore a considerable burden of death – it lost 6% of its people. More women – relatively undernourished, cooped up in unhygienic and ill-ventilated dwellings, and nursing the sick – died than men. The pandemic is believed to have infected a third of the world’s population and claimed between 50 and 100 million lives.
Gandhi and his febrile associates at the ashram were lucky to recover. In the parched countryside of northern India, the famous Hindi language writer and poet, Suryakant Tripathi, better known as Nirala, lost his wife and several members of his family to the flu. My family, he wrote, “disappeared in the blink of an eye”. He found the Ganges river “swollen with dead bodies”. Bodies piled up, and there wasn’t enough firewood to cremate them. To make matters worse, a failed monsoon led to a drought and famine-like conditions, leaving people underfed and weak, and pushed them into the cities, stoking the rapid spread of the disease.
Image copyright PRINT COLLECTORImage caption Bombay was one of the worst hit cities by the 1918 pandemic
To be sure, the medical realities are vastly different now. Although there’s still no cure, scientists have mapped the genetic material of the coronavirus, and there’s the promise of anti-viral drugs, and a vaccine. The 1918 flu happened in the pre-antibiotic era, and there was simply not enough medical equipment to provide to the critically ill. Also western medicines weren’t widely accepted in India then and most people relied on indigenous medication.
Yet, there appear to be some striking similarities between the two pandemics, separated by a century. And possibly there are some relevant lessons to learn from the flu, and the bungled response to it.
The outbreak in Bombay, an overcrowded city, was the source of the infection’s spread back then – this something that virologists are fearing now. With more than 20 million people, Bombay is India’s most populous city and Maharashtra, the state where it’s located, has reported the highest number of coronivirus cases in the country.
By early July in 1918, 230 people were dying of the disease every day, up nearly three times from the end of June. “The chief symptoms are high temperature and pains in the back and the complaint lasts three days,” The Times of India reported, adding that “nearly every house in Bombay has some of its inmates down with fever”. Workers stayed away from offices and factories. More Indian adults and children were infected than resident Europeans. The newspapers advised people to not spend time outside and stay at home. “The main remedy,” wrote The Times of India, “is to go to bed and not worry”. People were reminded the disease spread “mainly through human contact by means of infected secretions from the nose and mouths”.
“To avoid an attack one should keep away from all places where there is overcrowding and consequent risk of infection such as fairs, festivals, theatres, schools, public lecture halls, cinemas, entertainment parties, crowded railway carriages etc,” wrote the paper. People were advised to sleep in the open rather than in badly ventilated rooms, have nourishing food and get exercise.
“Above all,” The Times of India added, “do not worry too much about the disease”.
Image copyright PRINT COLLECTOR
Colonial authorities differed over the source of infection. Health official Turner believed that the people on the docked ship had brought the fever to Bombay, but the government insisted that the crew had caught the flu in the city itself. “This had been the characteristic response of the authorities, to attribute any epidemic that they could not control to India and what was invariably termed the ‘insanitary condition’ of Indians,” observed medical historian Mridula Ramanna in her magisterial study of how Bombay coped with the pandemic.
Later a government report bemoaned the state of India’s government and the urgent need to expand and reform it. Newspapers complained that officials remained in the hills during the emergency, and that the government had thrown people “on the hands of providence”. Hospital sweepers in Bombay, according to Laura Spinney, author of Pale Rider: The Spanish Flu of 1918 and How It Changed the World, stayed away from British soldiers recovering from the flu. “The sweepers had memories of the British response to the plague outbreak which killed eight million Indians between 1886 and 1914.”
Image copyright PRINT COLLECTORImage caption The hospitals in Bombay were overwhelmed by patients
“The colonial authorities also paid the price for the long indifference to indigenous health, since they were absolutely unequipped to deal with the disaster,” says Ms Spinney. “Also, there was a shortage of doctors as many were away on the war front.”
Eventually NGOs and volunteers joined the response. They set up dispensaries, removed corpses, arranged cremations, opened small hospitals, treated patients, raised money and ran centres to distribute clothes and medicine. Citizens formed anti-influenza committees. “Never before, perhaps, in the history of India, have the educated and more fortunately placed members of the community, come forward in large numbers to help their poorer brethren in time of distress,” a government report said.
Now, as the country battles another deadly infection, the government has responded swiftly. But, like a century ago, civilians will play a key role in limiting the virus’ spread. And as coronavirus cases climb, this is something India should keep in mind.
Seoul’s handling of the outbreak emphasises transparency and relies heavily on public cooperation in place of hardline measures such as lockdowns
While uncertainties remain, it is increasingly viewed by public health experts as a model to emulate for authorities desperate to keep Covid-19 in check
A woman wearing a face mask walks along the Han river at a park in Seoul, South Korea. Photo: AP
After announcing 600 new cases for March 3, the authorities reported 131 new infections a week later. On Friday, officials reported just 110, the lowest daily toll since February 21. The same day, the number of recovered patients, 177, exceeded new infections for the first time.President Moon Jae-in, while cautioning against premature optimism, has expressed hope that South Korea could soon enter a “phase of stability” if the trend holds firm.
With about 8,000 confirmed cases and more than 65 deaths, it was until recently the country with the most confirmed cases outside China – but South Korea has since emerged as a source of inspiration and hope for authorities around the world as they scramble to fight the pandemic.
South Korea’s infection rate falls without citywide lockdowns like China, Italy
11 Mar 2020
As countries ranging from the United States to Italy and Iran struggle to manage the virus, Seoul’s handling of the outbreak – involving a highly coordinated government response that has emphasised transparency and relied heavily on public cooperation in place of hardline measures such as lockdowns – is increasingly viewed by public health experts as a model to emulate for authorities desperate to keep the virus under control.
Whereas China, where the virus originated, and more recently Italy have placed millions of their citizens on lockdown, South Korea has not restricted people’s movements – not even in Daegu, the southeastern city at the centre of the country’s outbreak.
Instead, authorities have focused mandatory quarantine on infected patients and those with whom they have come into close contact, while advising the public to stay indoors, avoid public events, wear masks and practise good hygiene.
South Korean President Moon Jae-in visits the Korea Centres for Disease Control and Prevention on March 11. Photo: EPA
And while numerous countries have imposed sweeping travel bans – including the US, which has introduced dramatic restrictions on travel from Europe – Seoul has instead introduced “special immigration procedures” for heavily affected countries such as China, requiring travellers to undergo temperature checks, provide verified contact information and fill out health questionnaires.
[South Korea’s] approach seems less dramatic and more usable by other countries, compared with that used in mainland China – Ian MacKay, virologist at the University of Queensland
“More than a week of downward-trending case counts shows that the approach in South Korea has turned around an epidemic,” said Ian Mackay, a virologist at the University of Queensland, Australia. “This approach seems less dramatic and more usable by other countries, compared with that used in mainland China. If these trends continue, they will have managed to stop the growth of their epidemic.”
‘A SPECTACULAR FEAT’
The linchpin of South Korea’s response has been a testing programme that has screened more people per capita for the virus than any other country by far. By carrying out up to 15,000 tests per day, health officials have been able to screen some 250,000 people – about one in every 200 South Koreans – since January.
To encourage participation, testing is free for anyone referred by a doctor or displaying symptoms after recent contact with a confirmed case or travel to China. For anyone simply concerned about the risk of infection, the cost is a relatively affordable 160,000 won (US$135). Testing is available at hundreds of clinics, as well as some 50 drive-through testing stations that took their inspiration from past counterterrorism drills and can screen suspected patients in minutes.
“This country has a universal health-coverage system for the whole population and the economic burden for testing is very low,” said Kim Dong-hyun, president of the Korean Society of Epidemiology. “Tests are conducted for free if you have proper symptoms.”
The massive volume of data collected has enabled the authorities to pinpoint clusters of infection to better target their quarantine and disinfection efforts, and send members of the public text-message alerts to inform them of the past movements of infected patients in their area – even down to the names of shops and restaurants they visited.
This country has a universal health coverage system for the whole population and the economic burden for testing is very low – Kim Dong-hyun, president of the Korean Society of Epidemiology
“South Korea’s capability to test for early detection of viruses has developed greatly as it went through the 2009 new influenza outbreak and 2015 Mers [Middle East respiratory syndrome] outbreak,” said Kim Woo-joo, a professor of medicine at Korea University’s College of Medicine. “It ranks among the world’s top countries in this field.”
South Korea’s ‘drive-through’ coronavirus testing stations
Collecting this amount of data has also allowed the South Korean authorities to glean a clearer indication of the potential lethality of the virus, the fatality rate of which has diverged significantly from about 5 per cent in Italy to about 0.8 per cent in South Korea. Although factors including quality of health care, patient age and public awareness can affect the fatality rate of a virus, the scale of testing is among the most influential.
By comparison, in neighbouring Japan – which has confirmed more than 600 cases, not including the virus-stricken Diamond Princess cruise ship – the authorities had as of Friday tested over 10,000 people.
In the United States, where the authorities are unable to confirm the number of tests since they are being carried out by a patchwork of federal, state and private laboratories, the total was estimated to be fewer than 5,000 in a survey of available data by The Atlantic.
William Schaffner, a professor of preventive medicine and infectious diseases at Vanderbilt University School of Medicine in the US, said South Korea had pulled off a “spectacular” feat that was allowing health officials to track the virus and assess its intensity.
“We are unsure where our infection is and how intensely it is being transmitted in the US and we are only now starting to test,” he said.
Coronavirus is now classified as a pandemic
13 Mar 2020
South Korea is not unique in claiming some success in its fight against the virus. Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong, informed by past outbreaks such as severe acute respiratory syndrome (Sars) and Mers, have managed to keep confirmed cases low while eschewing the sort of draconian measures implemented in mainland China.
Early on, Hong Kong took some of the most comprehensive steps to implement “social distancing” – in which events are cancelled and venues closed to minimise contact between people – by shutting schools in late January, while the authorities produced a digital map of confirmed cases to allow people to avoid potentially infected areas.
In Taiwan, officials have pooled information from immigration and health insurance databases to track people’s travel histories and symptoms, and used phone tracking to ensure compliance with quarantine. Singapore has similarly tracked infected patients and traced their contacts, with stiff penalties for those who disobey quarantine or mislead the authorities about where they have travelled.
A worker disinfects a Seoul subway station as a precaution against the new coronavirus. Photo: AP
OPENNESS AND TRANSPARENCY
But where South Korea has stood apart is seemingly turning the tide against a major outbreak while maintaining openness and transparency. The largest cluster of cases in the country is linked to a secretive religious sect, Shincheonji, members of which have been accused of negligently spreading the virus as well as evading medical follow-ups and testing.
In addressing the Covid-19 outbreak, sound decision-making should not be about making a choice between maximised protection or minimal disruption – Yanzhong Huang, Council on Foreign Relations
“South Korea’s experience suggests that a country can contain the spread of the virus in a relatively short period of time without relying on draconian, at-all-costs containment measures,” said Yanzhong Huang, a senior fellow for global health at the Council on Foreign Relations in New York.
“For countries like the US, the Korean experience offers an acceptable, likely more viable, alternative to addressing the outbreak. In addressing the Covid-19 outbreak, sound decision-making should not be about making a choice between maximised protection and minimal disruption.”
China effectively barred 60 million people in Wuhan – ground zero of the outbreak – and the rest of the province of Hubei from leaving their homes, while restricting the movements of hundreds of millions of others across the country by shutting down public transport, banning private cars and setting up roadblocks.
‘I was stupidly overconfident’: a Korean coronavirus survivor’s tale
15 Mar 2020
The country claims to have effectively halted the spread of the virus after recording more than 80,000 cases and 3,100 deaths, and its daily updates have in recent weeks fallen from thousands of new cases to dozens. However, scepticism lingers over official figures after local and provincial officials in Hubei initially tried to hide the extent of the outbreak.
In a move widely seen to be aimed at touting the success of Beijing’s hardline measures, Chinese President Xi Jinping on Tuesday made his first visit to Wuhan, during which he called for businesses and factories to return to work as normal and for the country to refocus on economic growth.
“While China has been able to control Covid-19, I don’t think its draconian methods are worth copying in liberal democracies,” said Lawrence Gostin, director of the O’Neill Institute for National and Global Health Law at Georgetown University Law Centre in Washington. “Most democracies value human rights and freedoms … [not] the degree of social control we’ve seen in China. South Korea offers a better model.”
A nearly empty customer call centre in the Gocheok-dong neighbourhood of Seoul as workers isolate or work from home. Photo: EPA
But in a striking indication that Beijing’s harsh tactics could inform even liberal democratic societies, Italy on Monday announced a nationwide quarantine after a massive spike in cases caught the authorities off guard. Shops, restaurants and bars have been closed, while public gatherings and most travel have been banned in the European country, which has confirmed more than 15,000 cases and 1,000 deaths as of Friday – making it the site of the biggest outbreak outside China.
In the Philippines, President Rodrigo Duterte on Thursday announced a lockdown of the entire Metro Manila region and its 12.8 million people.
David Hui Shu-cheong, an expert in respiratory medicine at the Chinese University of Hong Kong, said Italy had responded “very slowly” to the outbreak, in contrast to South Korea.
Southeast Asia at risk of missing coronavirus cases amid dengue outbreak: experts
11 Mar 2020
Even as Beijing touted its success at fighting the virus, with state media recently insisting the “world owes China a ‘thank you’”, South Korea – which democratised in the late 1980s following decades of military dictatorship – has made no secret of its desire to promote a more liberal alternative.
At a press conference with foreign media this week, vice-health minister Kim Gang-lip said that while drastic measures such as locking down affected areas had demonstrated “modest effectiveness”, they suffered from being “coercive and inflexible”.
“Korea, as a democratic country, values globalisation and a pluralistic society,” he said.
“Therefore we believe we must transcend the limitations of the conventional approach to fighting infectious disease.”
Kim stressed that public trust was crucial to the government’s strategy. “The more transparently and quickly accurate information is provided, the more the people will trust the government,” he said. “They will act rationally for the good of the community at large.”
South Korean ministers listen to Prime Minister Chung Sye-kyun (on screen) during a meeting to discuss measures to deal with the spread of the new coronavirus. Photo: EPA
UNKNOWN FACTORS
Although the authorities have shut down schools nationwide, South Koreans have largely embraced self-isolation and social distancing of their own accord.
In the past fortnight, more than 12,000 businesses have applied for subsidies to pay the wages of employees while they temporarily close their doors due to the outbreak, according to the country’s labour ministry. Many shops in Daegu, the site of more than three-quarters of the country’s cases, have shut their doors, while shopping malls and cinemas across the country have become largely deserted as people stay at home. Catholic churches and Buddhist temples nationwide have suspended mass and prayer services.
“To an outsider, South Korea has handled an enormous surge in cases very well and seemed to mitigate further spread through forms of … passive social isolation,” said Howard P. Forman, a professor of public health policy at Yale School of Management.
Indonesian firms doing business with China face tough times with coronavirus outbreak
12 Mar 2020
Some experts suggest South Korean society’s emphasis on discipline and community may have given it room to avoid implementing more draconian measures.
“This measure appears to have been very successful but is reliant on the local population working with the response,” said Jeremy Rossman, an honorary senior lecturer in virology at the University of Kent. “It is not clear how effective this approach would be in other cultures and it does require effective communication with the local population.”
How a secretive church in South Korea became a coronavirus ‘super spreader’
However, South Korea’s response has not been without missteps or critics.
In mid-February, before it emerged that the virus had spread rapidly among Shincheonji followers, Moon made the ill-fated prediction that the outbreak would “disappear before long”.
The Korean Medical Association – the country’s largest association of doctors – and conservative media have criticised the president for not outright banning travel from China.
Nearly 1.5 million South Koreans have signed an online petition calling for Moon’s impeachment over his handling of the outbreak, and his approval rating this week dropped to just under 45 per cent – although, in a sign of reviving fortunes, an opinion poll released on Friday saw the president’s response rated favourably.
Medical workers attend to a woman who was feeling unwell upon her arrival at the Keimyung University hospital in Daegu. Photo: AFP
It is still too early to say whether the response is working – Kim Dong-hyun, president of the Korean Society of Epidemiology
Some experts caution that it is too early to tell if South Korea truly has the virus under control. The discovery of a new cluster of about 100 infections at a call centre in densely populated Seoul prompted a sudden uptick in cases on Wednesday, raising fears the virus could be on the verge of spreading uncontrollably nationwide.
“It is still too early to say whether the response is working,” said Kim, the president of the Korean Society of Epidemiology. “There is an optical illusion involved in the figures. The daily numbers of new cases appear to be decreasing as the screening of Shincheonji followers is coming to an end, but it must be noted that there are new clusters emerging in Seoul and other areas. We can’t lower vigilance.”
Like elsewhere, the country is facing unknown factors such as warming temperatures in the coming weeks and the arrival of travellers from new and emerging infection hotspots overseas. “We are seeing that in South Korea, large epidemics can be slowed,” said Mackay from the University of Queensland. “Can they be prevented? That will be the challenge for countries who have yet to see widespread community transmission.”
In the face of uncertainty, South Korea appears determined to hold firm to its strategy. During a visit to the Korea Centres for Disease Control and Prevention on Wednesday, Moon said the country’s response had received international recognition and allowed it to avoid the “extreme choice” of sweeping travel bans.
The next day, responding to the World Health Organisation’s decision to declare the virus a global pandemic, the president called on South Koreans to maintain hope that the virus would be overcome.
“It might take more time than we thought,” Moon said. “Everyone, please don’t become fatigued.”
AutoNavi’s latest data shows increase in offline traffic and searches of major business districts
Traffic data could signal that consumer activity in China has entered a recovery
AutoNavi’s mobile app users can search the names of malls and shops to see real-time traffic data. Photo: AP
Data from AutoNavi, the maps app operated by Alibaba Group Holding, shows that traffic in major shopping districts in China picked up by an average of 30 per cent over the past month, as consumer activity gradually returns to normal now that the coronavirus infection rate appears to have peaked in the country.
The early sign of increased consumer activity in China contrasts with the panic and economic uncertainty now engulfing Europe and the US, as the widening pandemic forces governments around the world to take lessons from China on how to tackle the spread of the disease with curfews and social distancing measures.
AutoNavi’s latest big data report, released on Monday, shows that traffic in and around shopping districts in several major cities in the country rose 30 per cent over the weekend of March 14-15 compared with the weekend of February 15-16, when the coronavirus in China was at its height and many areas in the country were under lockdown.
China’s Meituan Dianping to join maps service battle
15 Aug 2019
“Consumer confidence is starting to rebound as the coronavirus comes under control,” said Guo Ning, vice-president of AutoNavi. “We are seeing more and more people stepping out, with offline consumption slowly recovering.”
Alibaba is the owner of the South China Morning Post.
China’s nearly two-month lockdown has dealt a hammer blow to the economy, with retail sales – a key metric of consumption – down by 20.5 per cent across the combined two months of January and February, marking the first decline on record. The virus has however proved a boon for China’s e-commerce sector, as shoppers stuck at home buy even more online.
The new data appears to show that the country’s offline economy could now see a slow recovery. This does not mean that retail businesses can slack off on preventive measures – hand sanitiser, extra cleaning and temperature monitoring are likely to remain fixtures of everyday life in shopping malls.
AutoNavi’s mobile app users can search the names of malls and shops to see real-time traffic data – often used to avoid visiting malls at peak periods. AutoNavi said the average 30 per cent increase in traffic refers to the combined volume of people using the app to navigate the shopping destinations.
Alibaba’s AutoNavi crosses 100 million daily users
5 Oct 2018
AutoNavi has more than 400 million monthly active users, according to company data. It was the first domestic travel platform to exceed 100 million daily active users.
Digital maps have become a key tool in China’s attempts to control the coronavirus pandemic, with competitor map apps from Baidu and Tencent also launching features to track population flows and provide information on clinics able to test for and treat the disease.
Covid-19, as the novel coronavirus is known, has now killed over 3,200 people in China and infected just over 80,000, of which around 68,000 have recovered. There are now around 87,000 confirmed cases outside China, according to the latest figures from health authorities.
Image copyright GETTY IMAGESImage caption Chief Executive Carrie Lam said the majority of Hong Kong’s cases had been imported
Hong Kong will quarantine all people arriving from abroad for 14 days, its leader Carrie Lam has said.
The restrictions, which will kick in on Thursday, will not apply to those from Macau or Taiwan. Entrants from mainland China already had to self-isolate.
Ms Lam said the majority of Hong Kong’s cases had been imported, adding that “strict measures” were needed.
Hong Kong has seen 57 new infections over the past two weeks, 50 of which were imported, said Ms Lam.
“If we exclude these imported, we only have seven local cases in the past week,” she said.
“If we do not impose strict measures, our previous efforts could be wasted.”
Ms Lam also advised residents to avoid all non-essential travel.
There are at least 155 confirmed cases in the territory, which detected its first cases in January.
The territory – a special administrative region of China – has so far been able to avoid the contagion seen elsewhere, thanks partly to a quick government response.
In January, cross-border travel with mainland China was slashed. Soon afterwards, health workers went on strike to demand a total border shutdown.
Some of the restrictions in the Asia-Pacific region, as of 17 March:
Australia – All travellers will have to self-isolate for 14 days. Foreign nationals who have been to China, Iran, Korea and Italy not allowed in
New Zealand – Everyone entering the country will have to self-isolate for 14 days. This excludes those from small Pacific islands with no confirmed virus cases
South Korea – Travellers from China’s Hubei province not allowed in. International arrivals from certain countries will need to submit papers on their health condition
Singapore – All visitors with travel history to France, Germany, Italy, Spain, South Korea and China banned from entering or transiting. Residents with recent history to these countries will have to self-isolate for 14 days. All those entering from Japan, Switzerland, the UK and Asean countries will have to self-isolate for 14 days
Malaysia – All foreign visitors have been banned, all Malaysians will not be allowed to travel overseas until 31 March. All returning Malaysians will have to self quarantine for 14 days
Japan – Ban on entry to travellers who have been to parts of China, South Korea, Iran or Italy in 14 days before arrival
The number of confirmed coronavirus cases and deaths outside China has now surpassed the number inside.
More than 100,000 people have been infected outside China, while just over 80,000 cases have been reported inside.
There have been more than 182,000 confirmed cases of coronavirus globally and over 7,000 deaths, according to a tally from Johns Hopkins University.
Media caption Steps the NHS says you should take to protect yourself from Covid-19
CHINDIA ALERT: You'll be living in their world, very soon 