China ‘indecisive’ on Covid

Taiwanese expert says opportunity was missed to stop initial spread of virus in Wuhan

China’s authorities missed a crucial chance to curb the spread of Covid-19 in the early days of the pandemic, according to a Taiwanese infectious diseases expert who was one of the first foreign officials to find the virus was spreading between humans.

Professor Chuang Yin-ching, a senior member of Taiwan’s Centres for Disease Control (CDC), was dispatched to Wuhan on January 13-15, 2020, to investigate reports of a new Sars-like coronavirus.

In an interview with The Telegraph this week, he recalled the moment he grasped the seriousness of the situation during a meeting where experts from Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau grilled officials from the Wuhan and Hubei province CDC and the central government authorities in Beijing.

From the outset, the local officials and chairperson had appeared evasive, insisting there was no evidence of human-to-human transmission despite repeated questioning.

Chuang pressed for information about two known family clusters, including one unexplained, significant case of a husband who worked at the Huanan seafood market — the suspected ground zero of the outbreak — who appeared to have passed the virus onto his wife who had not visited the location.

“I could see the body language — he [Beijing official] tried to intervene, he put up his hand to try to stop the local authorities talking,” he said.

“Finally, the person from the central government said ‘why did you say the old conclusion? Now the conclusion is limited human-to human transmission cannot be excluded’. That was the answer we wanted to know.”

The admission coincided with the first recorded case of Covid-19 outside of China, in Thailand, on January 13. Chuang did not disclose the name of the senior Beijing health official who confirmed the human transmission conclusion. He does not know how far up the chain of command the knowledge reached, nor why local officials chose to sit on the data before warning the public.

On January 22, as millions travelled around China for Lunar New Year celebrations, the WHO issued a statement saying there was evidence of human-to-human transmission in Wuhan but more investigation was needed.

Prior to the statement, on January 18, Wuhan’s leaders gave the green light to a Guinness world-record attempt to create the largest ever potluck dinner, with 40,000 families in attendance. By early February, dozens of residential buildings in that neighbourhood had been designated “fever buildings”.

Zhou Xianwang, then Wuhan mayor, said permission for the event was granted on the basis that human transmission was “limited”.

But for Chuang, who by that point was back in Taipei warning the Taiwanese government to tighten border controls, “limited” still meant the virus was spreading between humans.

He does not know if the pandemic could have been stopped in Wuhan but said: “At least they could have tried to minimise the impact and to contain the pandemic in a limited area, limiting the possibility of it spreading to the rest of the world.”

Taiwan has long distrusted China on healthcare matters. Taipei has previously accused Beijing — which claims Taiwan as its own territory — of delaying vital assistance during the Sars outbreak in 2003.

But Hong Kong experts also felt growing disquiet in early January 2020. One said he was “horrified” when officials insisted the situation was under control even as Wuhan locked down on January 23.

The expert, who spoke anonymously, alleged the Chinese had initially persuaded the WHO not to call the crisis a Public Health Emergency of International Concern “so that they didn’t lose face in the eyes of the world.” This PHEIC declaration was finally made on January 30.

— Telegraph Group Ltd