Chronic Corona…

Oh...the damage to the makeup industry....

Alright, I am back from my sabbatical of writing half-assed, quarter boiled satire pieces as I was busy recovering from err…dipsomania…I was mostly writing film reviews as you can see. They are about as interesting as watching a caterpillar turning into another caterpillar.

Look at this: “The last time China was hit by a deadly illness like the Wuhan virus, it covered it up and 774 people died. There are fears it could happen again.”

   That’s not part of news content, folks, that is a goddam headline.

  It is because the entire world is plugging its orifices fearing insurgence of a virus that was not named after a Mexican beer (That’s Corona Beer…this is Coronavirus Beer…oh, I am kidding. It is just Novel Coronavirus with a scientific name of 2019-nCoV…to commemorate the glorious piece of shit year we had endured. How appropriate).

   Here’s what the newspaper that helped to bring down Nixon  recently has to say:

• ·    There are almost 14,400 confirmed cases of coronavirus in China, including 10 on the self-governing island of Taiwan, with more than 300 dead. A new study says as many as 75,815 people in Wuhan may have been infected.
• ·   The World Health Organization reports roughly 130 confirmed cases of the virus in more than 20 countries outside of China and Taiwan. The Philippines reported the first death attributable to the virus outside of China. New cases confirmed in South Korea and India.

   Following that, as you guys might know some countries are already pulling down and tying the checkpoint gate preventing tourists from China, specifically from the Wuhan district where the virus came from and there might be more where the latest came from.

   Anyway, in this region, the Philippines is the latest to temporarily ban travellers from China, including Hong Kong and Macao…owing to the first death outside of China in Manila due to that damned virus. So, instead of shooting any incoming diseased tourists, the country’s President holstered his weapon and just issued ban order instead. Dueterte has started embracing subtlety.

   And it doesn’t stop there,  a Chinese media noted that the United States, the European Union, Russia, Australia and Singapore have banned or restricted the entry of Chinese citizens, and any foreigners that have recently visited China.

The star itself....one ugly mother____

   Other countries that have placed travel restrictions on visitors from China include Mongolia, and  Malaysia and Japan are resisting residents from Hubei. In fact, at home, it was East Malaysia that imposed restrictions, much to its Chinese ambassador’s chagrin.

   “… I hope in a difficult situation like this, the normal flow of people and including the trade, commercial activities, should not be affected between China and Malaysia, including Sabah of course,” the ambassador noted in the report which is definitely not a thinly veiled threat over the future of the two countries’ trade growth. Of course, he's a nice guy.

   But we are aware that this is not fresh from the bakery item. In fact, China has been aware, as, according to another report, the knowledge of the virus had already been circulating somewhere at the end of last year.

   “From the same report, we learned that Wuhan health authorities were having overnight meetings about the new “SARS” at end of December,” an official was quoted as saying in that article.  “Earlier today. the Wuhan mayor said he was not ‘authorised’ to publicise the epidemic until Jan. 20.”

   Not “authorised” folks.

  The article also noted that the spread was also helped by China’s Lunar New Year holiday this month. 

   “Wuhan mayor Zhou Xianwang said 5 million people had left the city before travel restrictions were imposed ahead of the Chinese New Year. Ma Xiaowei, the director of China’s National Health Commission, said that the virus had an incubation period of 10 to 14 days.”

   Furthermore, it noted that while some people are cancelling travel plans in China and opting to stay home over the holiday period, others may not yet have experienced the worst of the symptoms, believe themselves to be well enough to travel and/or could be reluctant to pay up to US$400 to change a flight — especially if they believe they merely have a common cold.

   What screws things up is that period, during which the virus can be contagious but the patients do not display symptoms. And that makes it easy for it to be passed along like a goddam joint at a Hollywood party.

  Speaking of which, while writing this article, a buddy of mind pointed out the supposed premonition, the 2011 film "Contagion" as per this article which noted that “…buried within the film….is a stark warning that feels even timelier today, subtly conveying how one misguided policy decision or thoughtless action can have a devastating domino effect, sowing the seeds of destruction in a vast, interconnected world.”

Some comparison ...be afraid, be very afraid....

   And, we don’t and never learn. Especially China as this is not the first time it has been faced with such pandemic. Thanks to SARS, suspicion that more would come has took root back several years ago. This article questions  “Is China Ground Zero for a Future Pandemic?”

   It noted that the H7N9 (bird flu) first spread from birds to humans in 2013. Since then, there have been five waves of the virus. And this involved lessons not learned from the SARS outbreak, as per another article that quoted the Western experts as saying that 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” But after the first H7N9 outbreak in 2013, the expert quoted in the article observes, Chinese authorities did “exactly what should have been done. You need to get the word out as fast as possible, with transparency and urgency, so the world can respond.”

   Which then, happened this time. They did get the word out fast…but why is this happening again? For a country that is spending thrillions of Yuans on military, what are they doing in stopping these sort of epidemics, pandemics, whatever that’s killing innocent folks who are NOT Chinese citizens and causing shitload of losses in investment?

   Most nation are not going hard on China simply they don’t want to lose out on the monetary gain, the tourism dollars especially and the relationship with the cash-rich country that has knocked off Russia from the throne of being US’s frenemy.

   Sure, China has temporarily banned the trade of wild animals but that is all it was, a goddam knee-jerk reaction. What is it going to do to stop the whole shit hitting the fan when they have wiped it clean many time…whether they wiped the faces that got effected is something else entirely? But can it get its shit together this time?