Envoy: China-US mutual support needed right now

Beijing’s top envoy in Washington on Monday expressed solidarity with people in the United States, saying China is doing its best to support the US and other countries in their battle with the COVID-19 pandemic.

“In the fight against the virus, we stand together with the people of New York and America,” Cui Tiankai, Chinese ambassador to the US, said in a column that appeared in The New York Times print edition on Monday.

“We are facilitating the US government’s purchase of personal protective equipment made in China.”

Cui’s comments echoed remarks made on Friday by US Ambassador to China Terry Branstad, who said his embassy was “working closely” with Chinese government officials to facilitate the shipment of critical supplies of protective equipment from China.

Branstad also said, “No one country can fight this battle alone, and I am confident that our two countries will continue to find ways to jointly cooperate to combat this common enemy that threatens the lives of all of us.”

In his opinion piece, Cui conceded that there has been “unpleasant talk” between the two nations about the disease. He was apparently referring to the politicizing of the pandemic issue and the blame game regarding the origin of the virus.

“But this is not the time for finger-pointing,” he said. “This is a time for solidarity, collaboration and mutual support.”

Chinese companies have donated 1.5 million masks, 200,000 test kits, 180,000 gloves and many other medical supplies to the US, according to Cui.

The two biggest economies in the world need to lead international efforts in collaborative research into treatments and vaccines, and explore the sharing of pharmaceutical technologies among nations, he said.

“We need to help countries with underdeveloped medical systems and contribute to better global health governance,” Cui said in his column.

The Chinese embassy in the US said on Monday that it had conducted a survey regarding arrangements for charter flights to bring home Chinese students studying abroad, and a decision was taken to give priority to primary and secondary school students.

According to the announcement on the embassy’s website, primary and secondary Chinese students younger than age 18 who have stayed in the US either short- or long-term without their parents are now able to register for flights back home.

Some 1.6 million Chinese students are studying abroad and 410,000 of them are in the US, according to the Ministry of Education. An earlier survey revealed that over 60 percent of the Chinese students in the US would like to return immediately due to the growing number of infections reported there.

With summer vacation approaching, it is likely that an increasing number of Chinese students would like to come home, the embassy said.

The US reported over 330,000 infections with the death toll creeping toward the grim milestone of 10,000 on Sunday.

US President Donald Trump has warned the country to brace for a “horrific” next few weeks.

“The next week and a half, two weeks, I think they’re going to be very difficult,” Trump said.

Trump, who made the remark during the White House Coronavirus Task Force news briefing, also said that by Tuesday, 3,000 military and public health workers will be deployed across the nation to cope with the pandemic.

The federal government will be sending some 600,000 N95 respirators on Monday to the state of New York, the national epicenter of the coronavirus outbreak.

The US also is stepping up the development of treatments for COVID-19 patients, including experimenting with the anti-malarial drug hydroxychloroquine and blood-related therapies.

Dr Anthony Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, said at the White House briefing on Saturday there was no “definitive information to be able to make any comment” on whether hydroxychloroquine can be effective in treating the novel coronavirus.

It is possible that COVID-19 will stick around, he said on Sunday.

“Unless we get this globally under control, there is a very good chance that it’ll assume a seasonal nature,” Fauci told CBS’

“Hopefully, if in fact we do see that resurgence, we will have interventions that we did not have in the beginning of the situation that we’re in right now,” he said.

Fauci said that he expected new cases to escalate this week, with the national apex eight to nine days away. When new cases start to stabilize, as they have in New York, it is “the first sign of that plateau and coming down”, Fauci said.

US Defense Secretary Mark Esper defended the Navy’s decision to remove the commander of a coronavirus-stricken aircraft carrier, who was reported on Sunday to have tested positive for the virus as the number of the infected crew members on board surpassed 150.