Science doesn’t know yet
Consulting with Beijing isn’t likely
Americans can be forgiven if they’re not taking a heaping load of advice from the Red Chinese just now. At least when it comes to the covid-19 virus. Americans will take any lessons about how to limit the virus’ impact, and from anywhere, but having the ChiComs talk down to us is unseemly.
Beijing is limiting the number of American journalists in that country. And pushing the idea that the virus did not originate where the world knows it originated. And warning American officials on these shores not to dis
Red China’s early efforts to contain the virus and deceive its own people. Not to mention the rest of us.
So while many of us are hunkered down in our homes, postponing trips to see the old folks, and preparing for weeks without restaurants and schools, officials in Beijing have reported a drop in new cases. Emphasis on reported. And given that country’s lack of transparency before and after the Wuhan virus outbreak, we’d take those reports with a truckload of salt.
The official news agency in China— is there another kind in China?—has been on a tear lately to emphasize how swell the government has handled the pandemic. In an editorial just this week, China Daily said “the drastically worsening situations” in some countries show how important it is to quarantine and communicate. Now they tell us.
But instead of looking to mainland China for answers, we’d prefer to look to two democracies hit hard by the covid-19 disease, but with strangely different outcomes.
Look to Italy. Look to South Korea. Which Dr. Kent Sepkowitz did on CNN the other day.
Testing is important, according to the good doctor, which means authorities can isolate those exposed and treat them. Not that there’s any vaccine for the current virus yet. But containment can help those most in danger. Dr. Sepkowitz continued:
“So why does [South] Korea, the poster child of testing, have so few deaths while Italy and its late-to-the-table testing program have so many? . . . . For now, it is because of vast differences in the affected patients. Soon and increasingly, it also will be due to overwhelmed hospitals and doctors and nurses.
“Plenty has already been written about how the population of Italy differs from much of the world. According to a UN report in 2015, 28.6 percent of the Italian population was 60 years or older (second in the world after Japan at 33 percent). This compares to South Korea where 18.5 percent of the population is at lest 60 years of age, ranking 53rd globally.”
And there’s smoking.
Dr. Sepkowitz says smoking rates in the two countries are similar, but in Italy, nearly 30 percent of the men smoke cigarettes, as do 20 percent of the women. In South Korea, half the men smoke, but only 5 percent of the women. And the overall death rate in the early stages hit men harder.
Why was the death rate in Wuhan 4.7 percent for men and 2.8 percent for women? Science doesn’t know yet. And those percentages could change. But combine a gender bias with age and smoking, and this respiratory disease shows its preferences.
Surely more lessons will come as mankind keeps up with facts, figures, stats, percentages and doctor notes. For now, hunker down, y’all. And wash your hands.