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Rabu, 18 Maret 2020

China’s Expulsion of American Journalists Raises Red Flags Over Hong Kong - The Wall Street Journal

Chinese flags outside The Foreign Correspondents' Club in Hong Kong during a protest in August... — Chinese flags outside The Foreign Correspondents' Club in Hong Kong during a protest in August 2018.
Photo: alex hofford/epa-efe/rex/shutter/EPA/Shutterstock

Natasha Khan

The Wall Street Journal

Biography
@natashakhanhk
natasha.khan@wsj.com

Updated March 18, 2020 10:38 am ET

HONG KONG—The Chinese government’s move to ban more than a dozen journalists expelled from the mainland from reporting in Hong Kong heightened concerns about a further erosion of the city’s relative autonomy.

Protests that rocked the city last year and sent it spiraling into recession were fueled by widespread public anger at signs of Beijing restricting freedoms in the city. Chinese leaders guaranteed Hong Kong a high degree of autonomy until 2047 under a 50-year agreement called “one country, two systems” with the former colonial power, the U.K.

Chinese authorities said they would be revoking the press credentials for American journalists working for The Wall Street Journal, the New York Times and the Washington Post, effectively expelling them from the country. Beijing said it was retaliation for restrictions placed by the Trump administration on the number of Chinese journalists working in the U.S.

In an unusual move, China’s Foreign Ministry stipulated that the expelled foreign correspondents wouldn’t be allowed to continue reporting in the Hong Kong and Macau special administrative regions. Previously, some journalists expelled from the mainland have relocated and worked in Hong Kong.

The action struck at the city government’s right to control its own immigration policy, an encroachment that could affect the reputation of the business and financial hub. The announcement may further dent confidence in the rule of law in Hong Kong, especially among foreign investors who expressed alarm in 2018 when a foreign correspondent was expelled from the city for the first time.

The expulsions were a “necessary and reciprocal countermeasure China is compelled to take in response to the U.S. oppression of Chinese media,” a spokesperson for China’s Commissioner of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Hong Kong said Wednesday, adding that it was in accordance with Beijing’s purview over foreign affairs in accordance with ‘one country, two systems’ and the Basic Law, Hong Kong’s mini-constitution.

Under the Basic Law, immigration, including the power to permit or prohibit working, are exclusively matters for the Hong Kong government, said Sharron Fast, a media-law lecturer and deputy director of the University of Hong Kong’s Journalism and Media Studies Centre. But, she added, Beijing has the final authority in cases that also trigger national-security and foreign-affairs concerns.

The Hong Kong government said late Wednesday that its Immigration Department would consider the circumstances of each case and act in accordance with laws and immigration policies. It didn’t specifically address the cases of the expelled journalists.

Some local lawmakers and other critics questioned the legality of the move.

“I hope the government of Hong Kong will push back strongly on this gross infringement on its autonomy,” said U.S. Rep. Jim McGovern (D., Mass.), who is the chair of the Congressional-Executive Commission on China. “It will be difficult to maintain the special U.S.-Hong Kong relationship moving forward if Beijing is constantly eroding the ‘one country, two systems’ framework.”

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam speaks to the media in November 2019. Press freedom... — Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam speaks to the media in November 2019. Press freedom in Hong Kong is protected under the city’s mini-constitution.
Photo: thomas peter/Reuters

In November, President Trump signed The Hong Kong Human Rights and Democracy Act of 2019, which requires the secretary of state to certify annually that Hong Kong is autonomous enough from Beijing to retain favored trading status with the U.S. The legislation opened the door for a number of possible punitive measures, such as sanctions, against officials found to be violating the city’s agreed freedoms. The first report is due in a few months.

Beijing’s decree to pre-emptively bar the journalists from the city is unprecedented and a blatant violation of the principle of ‘one country, two systems,’ said Alvin Yeung, a barrister, legislator and leader of the pro-democracy Civic Party. “It will only further reinforce the international community’s impression that Hong Kong is losing its autonomy as China tightens its grip,” he said.

The pronouncement creates significant uncertainty for international businesses that have previously operated under the assumption that their business in Hong Kong was insulated from politics, said Antony Dapiran, a corporate lawyer based in the city and author of the book “City on Fire: the Fight for Hong Kong.”

In October 2018, Hong Kong authorities effectively expelled Victor Mallet, the Hong Kong-based Asia news editor for the Financial Times, after he hosted a press-club talk by an activist who had called for Hong Kong’s independence from China, a speech that angered Beijing. Then, however, local authorities never publicly stated the reason for the visa denial.

The decision to not renew Mr. Mallet’s visa provoked condemnation from the Hong Kong business and international communities. It was seen as a precursor of restrictions on foreign journalists working in Hong Kong that is now coming true, said Emily Lau, a former chairwoman of the city’s Democratic Party.

Press freedom in Hong Kong is protected under the Basic Law and, along with wider free-speech protections and a separate legal system to China, is a major selling point used by the local government to attract foreign businesses to the international financial and trading center. The city is currently reeling from rising unemployment and collapsing retail and tourism industries hurt by protests and more recently, the coronavirus.

Journalists don’t need specific press visas to report and several news organizations, including the Journal and the Times, maintain their regional headquarters in the city.

“As long as they meet the requirements for a work visa, they are free to do reporting in Hong Kong,” said Chris Yeung, chairman of the Hong Kong Journalists Association. “That the Foreign Ministry has effectively directly applied the order in Hong Kong makes a mockery of the pledge of giving the city powers to handle its internal affairs.”

U.S. citizens visiting Hong Kong for not more than three months aren’t required to obtain visas, according to the consulate website.

Concerns about tightening press freedom grew throughout more than six months of protests in 2019, when many international correspondents flew in to help with coverage. Several journalism organizations condemned the Hong Kong police force’s treatment of reporters covering events on the streets after some were injured.

The Foreign Correspondents’ Club of Hong Kong expressed its alarm at China’s expulsion order. It called on the Hong Kong government to immediately clarify the situation, and said if the independent decision-making of the local Immigration Department on the employment of foreign nationals had changed, it would “represent a serious erosion of the ‘One Country, Two Systems’ principle.”

China has periodically expelled journalists whose work angered them. Many have then moved to Hong Kong and continued to report on China from the city.

“I feel sorry that they won’t be able to report from Hong Kong, even though some of the reports are biased against the establishment,” said Regina Ip, an adviser to the current local administration and a pro-establishment lawmaker. “It is important that Hong Kong remains an international media center as part of ‘one country, two systems.’”

Write to Natasha Khan at natasha.khan@wsj.com

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2020-03-18 15:38:00Z
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China says decision to boot journalists was fault of US, warns it could kick out even more - Fox News

China's fresh crackdown on U.S. journalists stationed in Beijing not only echoes the Cold War era but comes at a time when the world is in desperate need of independent information by trusted journalists on the front lines of a global pandemic and not by state-run media that pushes propaganda.

The Trump administration and China have been at odds with one another in a very public tit-for-tat feud blaming the other for the origins of the coronavirus as well as China's handling of the crisis.

On Wednesday, China defended its decision to kick out U.S. reporters, saying it had been "compelled" to respond to "unreasonable oppression" of Chinese journalists working in the United States.

"We urge the U.S. to take off its ideological prejudice, abandon Cold War mentality," China's Foreign Ministry spokesperson Geng Shuang said during a press conference. "China is not one to start trouble, but it will not blink if trouble comes. We urge the U.S. side to immediately stop suppressing Chinese media, otherwise, the U.S. side will lose even more."

"China is not one to start trouble, but it will not blink if trouble comes. We urge the U.S. side to immediately stop suppresing Chinese media, otherwise the U.S. side will lose even more."
— Foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang

On Tuesday, China announced that it would be kicking out correspondents from The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Voice of America and Time magazine. Beijing justified its actions as retaliation over new rules the Trump administration placed on Chinese reporters, including a 100 reporter cap from five state-run media outlets. The outlets had 160 reporters in total, meaning 60 would be sent back to China.

TRUMP ADMINISTRATION HITS BACK AFTER CHINA KICKS OUT US JOURNALISTS AMID CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC

At the time, U.S. administration officials said the visa caps were to establish "reciprocity" with China on how the two nations should treat journalists.

The U.S. argued that Chinese reporters based in America were allowed to operate unencumbered while the opposite was true for American journalists working in China. More than 80 percent of foreign correspondents surveyed in China have said they had encountered "harassment or violence" when working.

The Trump administration took another swipe at Beijing by designating state-run media outlets as "foreign missions" of the Chinese government to describe their functions as propaganda tools for President Xi Jinping and his Communist Party. The designated five outlets are: Xinhua, CGTN, China Daily, China Radio International and People's Daily, the Communist Party's mouthpiece.

CORONAVIRUS CASES TOP 200,000 WORLDWIDE, DEATH TOLL PASSES 8,000

"The individuals that we identified a few weeks back were not media that were acting here freely," Secretary of State Mike Pompeo said Tuesday. "They were part of Chinese propaganda outlets. We've identified these as foreign missions under American law. These aren't apples to apples, and I regret China's decision today to further foreclose the world's ability to conduct free press operations."

The executive editors of the NYT, the Post and WSJ all issued statements strongly condemning Beijing's expulsion of their reporters.

Dean Baquet, the executive editor of the NYT, said it was critical that the governments of the United States and China move quickly to resolve their tit-for-tat issues and "allow journalists to do the important work of informing the public.”

Following the news out of China Tuesday afternoon, the National Security Council tweeted: "The Chinese Communist Party's decision to expel journalists from China and Hong Kong is yet another step toward depriving the Chinese people and the world of access to true information about China. The United States calls on China's leaders to refocus their efforts from expelling journalists and spreading disinformation to joining all nations in stopping the Wuhan coronavirus."

China and the United States have long had a complicated relationship and continuing to call COVID-19 the "Wuhan coronavirus" or the "China virus" is probably not going to help it. China has demanded U.S. leaders stop using the phrases because it stigmatizes China and borders on being racist.

Their threat didn't have much of an effect on President Trump, who doubled down on calling the coronavirus "the China virus."

"China was putting out information that was false, that our military gave this to them. That was false and rather than having an argument I said, 'I have to call it where it came from. It did come from China so I think it's a very accurate term... I didn't appreciate the fact that China was saying that our military gave it to them. Our military did not give it to anybody," Trump said.

"I didn't apprecita the fact that China was saying that our military gave it to them. Our military did not give it to anybody."
— President Trump

He also pushed back on claims China has made that the term "China virus" or "Wuhan virus" places an unfair stigma on Xi's country.

"Saying that our military gave it to them creates a stigma," Trump said.

China and the United States have been trading jabs almost daily.

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Xi's Community Party has been working overtime trying to reframe the narrative that China's suppression of vital information about the virus for more than a month attributed to the entire world being infected by the quick spreading COVID-19 virus.

The total number of confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus worldwide has now topped 200,000, Johns Hopkins University said Wednesday. More than 8,000 people have died from the coronavirus.

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2020-03-18 14:38:19Z
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China defends expulsion of journalists, warns more possible | TheHill - The Hill

China on Wednesday defended its decision to expel journalists working for three American news organizations and to forbid them from working in Hong Kong, adding that more expulsions could be coming.

Chinese foreign ministry spokesman Geng Shuang said during a daily press briefing that China would take more steps against American media if the U.S. did not “correct its mistakes,” Reuters reported.

“The U.S. has said that all options are on the table. Today, I can also tell the U.S. that all options are on the table for China,” Geng said, according to Reuters.

China announced Tuesday that journalists from The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post would be forced to leave the country at the end of 2020 and would not be permitted to work in Hong Kong as allowed during past expulsions.

The decision will affect at least 13 journalists, according to the Foreign Correspondents Club of China, which said it “deplores” the choice. The club has requested that Hong Kong ensure that foreign journalists and those applying for work in the semi-autonomous city would still receive employment without the Chinese government getting involved.

The Chinese government said the expulsions were in reaction to U.S. actions against Chinese media, such as requiring Chinese state media to register as foreign embassies and reducing the number of journalists allowed to work for these outlets in the U.S.

The decision to prohibit the reporters from working in Hong Kong has specifically stirred outrage given the one-country, two-systems relationship put in place after China took control of Hong Kong in 1997. Reporters have previously been allowed to work in Hong Kong after they were expelled from China.

Chinese officials said they were allowed to forbid the reporters from working in Hong Kong. Hong Kong’s Basic Law, which is its small constitution, says China can manage its foreign affairs and defense.

China had previously expelled three Wall Street Journal reporters because of an op-ed headline that the foreign ministry labeled as racist. The headline was “China is the Real Sick Man of Asia,” referring to the coronavirus outbreak.

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2020-03-18 12:37:17Z
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China Rebukes the U.S. After Saying It Will Expel American Journalists - The New York Times

HONG KONG — China took a combative stance on Wednesday, accusing the United States of starting a diplomatic war that led it to expel almost all American journalists from three newspapers.

In articles and commentaries from China’s propaganda organs as well as remarks by a top spokeswoman, Beijing indicated it would not back down, accusing the United States of starting the dispute. The state media commentary also focused sharply on reporting by the three outlets, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post, which the government has often accused of being unfair.

“We reject ideological bias against China, reject fake news made in the name of press freedom, reject breaches of ethics in journalism,” tweeted Hua Chunying, a Chinese foreign ministry spokeswoman.

An article from The Global Times, a stridently nationalistic tabloid controlled by the Chinese Communist Party, criticized the The New York Times’s coverage of the coronavirus outbreak, the monthslong antigovernment protests in Hong Kong, and the Chinese authorities’ internment of ethnic minority Muslims in far western Xinjiang. The paper’s coverage of the epidemic, the article said, was “aiming to attack China’s political system and smear China’s efforts” to contain the virus.

It said reports by the Times and other outlets about the government’s policies in the Xinjiang region had “smeared and attacked China without basis.”

Under China’s leader, Xi Jinping, the news media has come under an increasingly tighter grip and foreign reporters have been punished with visa denials. In recent weeks as the coronavirus spread through China, the government cracked down on domestic and foreign reporting, muzzling medical professionals and censoring and removing reports and commentary online that has challenged the official narrative.

China said Tuesday that it would require all American journalists for the three newspapers whose credentials expire by the end of the year to turn in their press cards within 10 days. It said they would not be allowed to continue working as journalists in China.

In an unusual move, its announcement said the Americans were also forbidden from working as journalists in Macau or Hong Kong, two semiautonomous Chinese territories that have traditionally had greater protections for press freedom than the mainland. It was not immediately clear how Beijing would enforce this.

China also said it was requiring the three outlets as well as Time magazine and Voice of America to disclose details of their staff, assets and operations in China.

The move would affect at least 13 American journalists but the number could be higher, the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China said in a statement on Wednesday.

The organization said the expulsion “diminishes us in number and in spirit, though not in our commitment to vigorously cover China. There are no winners in the use of journalists as diplomatic pawns by the world’s two pre-eminent economic powers.”

The news outlets condemned the Chinese government’s decision. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called the expulsions “unfortunate” and said he hoped China would reconsider.

Beijing has said that the move was in retaliation for the Trump administration’s decision to limit the number of Chinese citizens from five state-controlled Chinese media outlets who can work in the United States to 100, which forced the expulsion of about 60.

The Global Times echoed this in an editorial on Wednesday that accused Washington of starting the tit-for-tat. “As a Chinese media, we regret that the conflict between China and the United States has escalated due to political differences,” adding that both Chinese and American journalists were “implicated by political frictions between China and the United States.”

The moves against the American outlets follow the expulsion of three Journal reporters over the headline last month, “China Is the Real Sick Man of Asia,” on an op-ed column about the country’s coronavirus response efforts.

In recent days, the People’s Daily, a Communist Party mouthpiece, and China Daily, a state-run newspaper, posted messages that circulated widely on China’s Twitter-like forum Weibo targeting the Times for what they called “double standards” in its tweets about the lockdown imposed in China and in Italy to curb the spread of the virus.

The foreign ministry left several questions unanswered in its statement on Tuesday, including how and whether the Hong Kong government would take further steps to enforce Beijing’s expulsion. Hong Kong operates under a political formula known as “one country, two systems,” that promises the Chinese territory a high degree of autonomy, including independent courts, a free news media and extensive protections of civil liberties.

Many global news organizations use Hong Kong as headquarters for the Asia region. Under the Basic Law, Hong Kong’s mini-constitution, the region has jurisdiction over immigration matters. If Hong Kong refused to allow the journalists to work in the city, it would be seen by some critics as the latest sign of eroding freedoms in the territory.

“Whichever way Beijing decides to proceed, it will be a blow to the ‘one country, two systems’ formula,” said Jason Y. Ng, a prominent writer and lawyer in Hong Kong. “So let’s hope that this hastily put together statement is more political posturing than genuine policy and that the Foreign Ministry has no intention to actually implement it in Hong Kong.”

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2020-03-18 12:18:08Z
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Coronavirus cases top 200,000 worldwide, death toll passes 8,000 - Fox News

The total number of confirmed cases of the novel coronavirus worldwide has now surpassed 200,000, according to Johns Hopkins University, while the death toll has topped 8,000.

The Johns Hopkins Center for Systems Science and Engineering's online tally showed 201,436 cumulative cases by 11:13 GMT (6:13 a.m. EST) on Tuesday, with 82,032 listed as recovered.

CRIME AND CORONAVIRUS: DOJ SEEKS FRAUDSTERS, TRIALS SUSPENDED, JAILS FEAR OUTBREAKS

It also recorded 8,006 deaths.

The countries with the most confirmed cases were China, Italy, Iran, Spain and Germany. At least 81,102 people in China, 31,506 people in Italy, 16,169 people in Iran, 13,716 in Spain and 9,877 people in Germany were infected.

The countries with the most confirmed deaths were China, Italy, Iran, Spain and France. At least 3,122 people died in China, compared to the 2,503 deaths in Italy, 988 deaths in Iran, 558 deaths in Spain and 148 deaths in France.

CLICK HERE FOR COMPLETE CORONAVIRUS COVERAGE

Last week, the World Health Origanization declared Europe the epicenter of the global pandemic of the coronavirus, which originated in the city of Wuhan in China's Hubei province.

The European Union announced Tuesday it was sealing its borders for its 26 member states as well as as Iceland, Liechtenstein, Norway and Switzerland, banning travel from the bloc for 30 days, the BBC reported. That came the same day France announced a nationwide lockdown, following suit from countries like Italy and Spain, as part of an effort to curb the spread of infection.

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This is a developing story. Check back for updates.

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2020-03-18 11:52:20Z
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China Rebukes the U.S. After Saying It Will Expel American Journalists - The New York Times

HONG KONG — China took a combative stance on Wednesday, accusing the United States of starting a diplomatic war that led it to expel almost all American journalists from three newspapers.

It said reports by the Times and other outlets about the government’s policies in the Xinjiang region had “smeared and attacked China without basis.”

China also said it was requiring the three outlets as well as Time magazine and Voice of America to disclose details of their staff, assets and operations in China.

The move would affect at least 13 American journalists but the number could be higher, the Foreign Correspondents’ Club of China said in a statement on Wednesday.

The news outlets condemned the Chinese government’s decision. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo called the expulsions “unfortunate” and said he hoped China would reconsider.

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Selasa, 17 Maret 2020

Tracking the Coronavirus: How Crowded Asian Cities Tackled an Epidemic - The New York Times

SINGAPORE — Two hours. That’s all the time medical teams in Singapore are given to uncover the first details of how patients contracted the coronavirus and which people they might infect.

Did they travel abroad? Do they have a link to one of the five clusters of contagion identified across the city-state? Did they cough on someone in the street? Who are their friends and family, their drinking buddies and partners in prayer?

As Western nations struggle with the wildfire spread of the coronavirus, Singapore’s strategy, of moving rapidly to track down and test suspected cases, provides a model for keeping the epidemic at bay, even if it can’t completely stamp out infections.

With detailed detective work, the government’s contact tracers found, among others, a group of avid singers who warbled and expelled respiratory droplets together, spreading the virus to their families and then to a gym and a church — forming the largest concentration of cases in Singapore.

“We want to stay one or two steps ahead of the virus,” said Vernon Lee, the director of the communicable diseases division at Singapore’s Ministry of Health. “If you chase the virus, you will always be behind the curve.”

Singapore, along with Taiwan and Hong Kong, offers successful approaches, at least so far, in battling a pandemic that has infected more than 182,000 people and killed at least 7,300 worldwide. Despite being hit months ago by the virus, these three Asian societies have recorded only a handful of deaths and relatively few cases, although they continue to face risks as people from emerging hot spots in the United States, Europe and elsewhere carry the virus with them.

Early intervention is key. So are painstaking tracking, enforced quarantines and meticulous social distancing — all coordinated by a leadership willing to act fast and be transparent.

In Singapore, the details of where patients live, work and play are released quickly online, allowing others to protect themselves. Close contacts of patients are quarantined to limit the spread. The government further strengthened its borders this week to protect against a new wave of imported infections.

Some of these lessons are too late for the United States and Europe, where contagion is raging as some governments delay and debate their response.

And the vigilant monitoring systems in Singapore, Taiwan and Hong Kong were built over years, after their failures to stop another dangerous outbreak — SARS — 17 years ago. The United States disbanded its pandemic response unit in 2018.

There is also the question of how replicable this model from smaller Asian centers is in large Western countries where people might chafe at the harnessing of C.C.T.V. cameras or immigration records for the health of the nation. Disease control infringes on individual liberties, and places like Singapore, where chewing gum was once banned, are more willing to accept government orders.

“Maybe it’s because of our Asian context, but our community is sort of primed for this,” said Lalitha Kurupatham, the deputy director of the communicable diseases division in Singapore. “We will keep fighting, because isolation and quarantine work.”

Rich and orderly, Singapore has spent years building a public health system that includes designated clinics for epidemics and official messaging urging the public to wash their hands or sneeze into tissues during flu season. The Infectious Diseases Act gives the city-state wide latitude in prioritizing the common good over privacy concerns.

“During peacetime, we plan for epidemics like this,” Ms. Kurupatham said.

As the leader of Singapore’s contact tracing program, she has been working 16-hour days for two months, and her depiction of a war against disease is a function of its vulnerability to contagion. A tiny red dot on a world map, Singapore is a densely populated island where every flight is international.

In the early days of the outbreak, Singapore was highly susceptible to a large population of mainland Chinese people arriving during the Lunar New Year holiday.

The dozens of confirmed cases in Singapore in January reflect widespread and freely available testing. Many were mild cases that would otherwise have gone undiagnosed. Nevertheless Singapore was sprinting to stem the possibility of runaway local transmission.

“Until Italy, Korea and Iran happened, Singapore was the worst outside China,” said Linfa Wang, the director of the emerging infectious diseases program at the Duke-National University of Singapore Medical School. “Why didn’t we feel that way? Because the government is very transparent and because that number means we are so effective in tracing and isolating every case.”

For all the panic erupting elsewhere, most Singaporeans do not wear masks out, because the government has told them it’s not needed for their safety. Most schools are still running, albeit with staggered lunchtimes to avoid big crowds. There is plenty of toilet paper.

As of Tuesday evening, Singapore had 266 confirmed cases. Only a fraction are mysteries, unlinked to recent foreign travel or previously identified local clusters, which include churches and a private dinner.

Nearly 115 patients have been discharged from the hospital. Singapore has recorded no deaths from the coronavirus.

When rumors of a mysterious respiratory virus began circulating in China at the beginning of the year, Singapore moved quickly. It was one of the first countries to ban all travelers from mainland China, starting in late January. Thermal scanners measured the temperatures of all who came into the country.

In a nation of 5.7 million residents, Singapore rapidly developed the capacity to test more than 2,000 people a day for the coronavirus. In Washington State, one of the hardest hit places in the United States, public labs are aiming to process 400 samples a day.

Testing is free in Singapore, as is medical treatment for all locals. Singapore has 140 contact tracers outlining each patient’s case history, along with the police and security services doing the shoe-leather work.

After weeks of investigation and the use of a new antibody test that can detect people who have recovered, health officials were able to tie two church clusters of 33 people to a Lunar New Year dinner attended by members of both congregations. The people who transmitted the disease between the two churches had never shown serious symptoms.

Close contacts of patients are put into mandatory quarantine to stop further contagion. Nearly 5,000 have been isolated. Those who dodge quarantine orders can face criminal charges.

All pneumonia patients in Singapore are tested for coronavirus. So are people who are seriously ill. Positive cases have been identified at the airport, at government clinics and, most frequently, through contact tracing.

Singapore’s epidemic regimen was shaped by the 2003 SARS outbreak, when 33 people died out of 238 confirmed cases. As in Hong Kong, medical workers were among the casualties in Singapore.

Hong Kong’s heavy death toll from SARS, nearly 300 people, has spurred residents in the semiautonomous Chinese territory to exercise vestigial muscles of disease prevention this time around, even as the local authorities initially dithered on whether to close the border with mainland China. Nearly everyone, it seemed, began squirting hand sanitizer. Malls and offices set up thermal scanners.

“The most important thing is that Hong Kong people have deep memories of the SARS outbreak,” said Kwok Ka-ki, a lawmaker in Hong Kong who is also a doctor. “Every citizen did their part, including wearing masks and washing their hands and taking necessary precautions, such as avoiding crowded places and gatherings.”

The Hong Kong government eventually caught up to the public’s caution. Borders were tightened. Civil servants were ordered to work from home, prompting more companies to follow suit. Schools were closed in January, until at least the end of April.

Taiwan acted even faster. Like Hong Kong and Singapore, Taiwan was linked by direct flights to Wuhan, the Chinese city where the virus is believed to have originated. Taiwan’s national health command center, which was set up after SARS killed 37 people, began ordering screenings of passengers from Wuhan in late December even before Beijing admitted that the coronavirus was spreading between humans.

“Having learned our lesson before from SARS, as soon as the outbreak began, we adopted a whole-of-government approach,” said Joseph Wu, Taiwan’s foreign minister.

By the end of January, Taiwan had suspended flights from China, despite the World Health Organization’s advising against it. The government also embraced big data, integrating its national health insurance database with its immigration and customs information to trace potential cases, said Jason Wang, the director of the Center for Policy, Outcomes and Prevention at Stanford University. When coronavirus cases were discovered on the Diamond Princess cruise ship after a stop in Taiwan, text messages were sent to every mobile phone on the island, listing each restaurant, tourist site and destination that the ship’s passengers had visited during their shore leave.

As of Tuesday, Taiwan had recorded 77 cases of the coronavirus, although critics worry that testing is not widespread enough. Students returned to school in late February.

With new waves of the virus surging across the world, public health officials in the three locales are gearing up for a longer fight.

On Tuesday, the government of Hong Kong, where only 157 cases have been confirmed, announced a mandatory 14-day quarantine for all travelers from abroad beginning later this week.

Taiwan will require self-quarantine for arrivals from 20 countries and three American states.

Prime Minister Lee Hsien Loong of Singapore warned last week that the country’s caseload would increase sharply. Singapore announced 23 new coronavirus patients on Tuesday, the highest single-day tally, with 17 imported cases.

The city-state has restricted its borders further. Arrivals from Southeast Asia and parts of Europe must now undergo a 14-day self-quarantine.

“The world is only as good as the weakest link,” said Dr. Lee, the head of Singapore’s communicable diseases division. “Diseases do not respect borders.”

Chris Horton contributed reporting from Taipei, Taiwan, and Elaine Yu from Hong Kong.

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2020-03-17 17:16:02Z
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Rabu, 18 Maret 2020

Chinese flags outside The Foreign Correspondents' Club in Hong Kong during a protest in August 2018.

Hong Kong Chief Executive Carrie Lam speaks to the media in November 2019. Press freedom in Hong Kong is protected under the city’s mini-constitution.

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Selasa, 17 Maret 2020