Lawsuits mounting against China

ST. PETERSBURG, FLA. >> Before the coronavirus outbreak, Saundra AndringaMeuer was a healthy 61-yearold mother of six who never smoked or drank alcohol. Then she became seriously ill with the disease after traveling from her Wisconsin home to help her son move from college in Connecticut.

She was hospitalized in March, ending up in a coma and on a ventilator for 14 days. When she emerged, she was told she was the sickest COVID-19 patient they had seen survive.

Now Andringa-Meuer has joined with dozens of other American virus patients and some U.S. businesses in taking a new legal step: They are attempting to sue China over the spread of the virus, which has killed more than 80,000 people in the U.S.

So far, at least nine lawsuits have been filed in the U.S. against China claiming authorities there did not do enough to corral the virus initially, tried to hide what was happening in the outbreak center of Wuhan, and sought to conceal their actions and what they knew.

Eight of the lawsuits are potential class actions that would represent thousands of people and businesses. One was filed by the attorney general of Missouri, which is so far the only state to take legal action against China.

The cases face several hurdles under the Foreign Sovereign Immunities Act, which states that foreign governments cannot be sued in the U.S. unless certain exceptions are met. And those are not easy to prove, experts say.

One exception involves commercial activity that directly affects the U.S. Another is misconduct inside the U.S. under certain circumstances that is traceable to a foreign government. A third exception is whether the foreign entity explicitly waived its immunity, such as through language in a contract.