Saturday, April 18, 2020

China's 'Mask Diplomacy' Is Not Working

Cars drive by a billboard of Chinese President Xi Jinping alongside the words "thanks, brother Xi" written in Serbian and Chinese, in Belgrade, Serbia, on April 1, 2020. Djordje Kojadinovic/Reuters

Business Insider: China is attempting to win political points from the coronavirus with 'mask diplomacy' — but it mostly isn't working

* China has been sending medical teams and protective equipment to countries battling the coronavirus, a strategy dubbed "mask diplomacy."
* While sending medical help is inherently benign, China seems to have another motive: to win points on the world stage.
* Officials at home have been praising China's "helping hand" abroad, and diplomats are reportedly asking foreign officials to praise China in public.
* Though China's efforts have borne fruit in a few places, many are still skeptical of Beijing's motives and don't see it as a trustworthy leader in the outbreak.

Over the past few weeks, China has been sending medics, masks, ventilators, and shipments of other precious protective equipment to countries in the midst of the global coronavirus outbreak.

While the care packages will surely help those who receive them — the US, Spain, Italy, France, and Britain have all reported more than 10,000 deaths — they are likely underpinned by hard-nosed calculation.

The shipments are part of a broad effort — dubbed "mask diplomacy" to win goodwill around the world, and help establish the in the role of global leadership it has long aspired to take on.

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WNU Editor: Country's are now focused on combating the Covid-19 coronavirus, and will take whatever China (or any other country) can offer. But I expect that when this pandemic is over, countries around the world are going to ask hard questions on how did this pandemic start, and who should be held accountable. Here is an easy prediction. When this is over, all eyes will be on China.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Not so fast.

As much as I despise Xi and the communist party (& liberals in general), The US has some blame.

Why contract out research that you won't do at home, because it is too dangerous?

In the US many pigs never see the light of day. They are raised in barns. As such they do not pick up pneumonia from rutting around in the ground outside. The pneumonia is courtesy of bird droppings or so I have been told. So pigs nowadays are raised in controlled environments are pretty much look like clones. They are all about the same size and weight. You use to be able to drive on highways or interstates and see pig sheds (little A frame sheds) out in pastures. I have not seen one in a long time and now I know why.

Now consider the pigs in China are not yet all factory farmed. Some are outside rutting around looking for more food than the farmer hands out. Just like birds, bats poop on the fly and they don't care. They only difference is they do it at night.

Birds and bats are quite alike. To fly they have high metabolisms and high temperatures. Viruses acclimating to those rats on wings feathered or not, are acclimated to an elevated body temperature. So as pointed out the usual human mechanism of running a fever does not help us out.

I believe you do not outsource your manufacturing to another continent and you sure as hell should not outsource you research. You should not out source it, because the research is just too dangerous.

I can see Fauci looking for emergent strains from abroad. I cannot see him funding research in China, because it is considered too dangerous to conduct it in the US. Especially with the Chinese track record on shoddiness. Not all Chinese companies and may not the majority, but too often so as to make it an issue.

The virus investigation should have been done in the Us and in China jointly.

Anonymous said...

Coronavirus: five months on, what scientists know about Covid-19