In this photo released by China’s Xinhua News Agency, Chinese President Xi Jinping talks by video with patients and medical workers at the Huoshenshan Hospital in Wuhan in central China’s Hubei Province, Tuesday, March 10, 2020. China’s president visited the center of the global virus outbreak Tuesday as Italy began a sweeping nationwide travel ban and people worldwide braced for the possibility of recession. For most people, the new coronavirus causes only mild or moderate symptoms, such as fever and cough. For some, especially older adults and people with existing health problems, it can cause more severe illness, including pneumonia. (Xie Huanchi/Xinhua via AP)
We’ve been told by the Chinese government that their country is in recovery, people are getting back to work and if not quite “all is well” certainly on their way back to normal.
I do think they may have had a reduction in cases, although I also believe they are lying about the actual numbers. As we have observed in the past, there are multiple reports out of China suggesting that the numbers might not be accurate, that they may have been manipulated.
If you look at the Worldometers number for cases in China, you can see a complete and severe drop in “new cases” after Feb. 12. By comparison, with Italy you can see the reduction is more gradual as one might expect.
But the failure to trust Chinese officials’ numbers may have resulted in a riot on a bridge between the Wuhan virus affected Hubei Province and the neighboring Jiangxi province.
Turns out the folks in Jiangxi didn’t quite believe that the folks in the Hubei region were safe and allegedly were blocking them from crossing the bridge to go to work and do other things in Jiangxi. The people in Hubei are of course desperate to go to work and leave the area now that some of the restrictions have been lifted for some of the people in Hubei.
1/ Riot outbreaks on border bridge between Hubei and Jiangxi in China today.
the conflict starts due to police from different provinces fighting for jurisdiction on checking #COVID19
It escalates into mess riot which blocked whole bridge.
more vids comingpic.twitter.com/gjErDfgqVd— 巴丢草 Badiucao (@badiucao) March 27, 2020
2/ pretty intense
how it eventually evolves to this mess is still covered.
rumor says it started because Jiangxi police dont want to lift the border to Hubei province where most #COVID19 infection reported.
No one trust official numbers even for police— 巴丢草 Badiucao (@badiucao) March 27, 2020
3/ i am not saying this a revolution or protest. But it is the closest thing u can find in China now. After so many weeks of desperate lock down due to the #COVID2019
everyone has been pushed to its limit.
its about exploding.— 巴丢草 Badiucao (@badiucao) March 27, 2020
4/ people r chanting 湖北加油 “Hibei fight on” marching towards military riot police from Jiangxi side of the bridge.
A lot said Jiangxi police dont want to lift lockdown on Hibei side due to intrust of #COVID2019 has been under control in Hubei province.pic.twitter.com/DKFDN1yfxE— 巴丢草 Badiucao (@badiucao) March 27, 2020
5/ angry people from Hubei province try to rock over the riot police van on the border bridge afrer weeks of brutal lockdown.pic.twitter.com/h4gZT5xTi5
— 巴丢草 Badiucao (@badiucao) March 27, 2020
From Globe and Mail:
Police vehicles were overturned and police scuffled with each other amid large crowds of shouting people, according to a series of videos posted to Chinese social media. The confrontation came after authorities in Jiangxi blocked entry to people from Hubei, local media reported.[….]
People from Hubei have been refused entry to hotels and their homes, even if they were not in Hubei during the past two months. On social media, people have reported being barred from entering Beijing merely because their hometown is in Hubei.
Now, the release of some of the lockdown measures means large numbers of people from Hubei are attempting to move elsewhere in China, threatening new hostilities.
On Friday, videos of the bridge confrontation showed a line of uniformed officers behind riot shields positioned across the bridge, blocking movement from Hubei province across the Yangtze River into Jiujiang, a city in Jiangxi. A large crowd marched toward the blockade chanting “Let’s go, Hubei!” In another video, Ma Yangzhou, the secretary of the party committee in Huangmei County on the Hubei side, urges people to disperse. “It’s dangerous for you to gather like this on the bridge,” he said, citing both the block to transportation and “the risk of virus infection.”
Hubei claims it had only one new case in the past week. People have lined up to take a required test to be able to get out of Hubei, but further restrictions are expected to be lifted on April 8.
Health authorities have acknowledged that their tally of confirmed cases does not include people who have the virus but have not shown symptoms. Those asymptomatic cases are believed to number in the tens of thousands.
New questions have also emerged about the accuracy of the official death toll. Earlier this week, authorities began to distribute to family members the ashes of their cremated loved ones. Photos taken by people at funeral homes showed long lines and large numbers of remains. Photos published by Caixin Media from one of Wuhan’s eight funeral homes showed well in excess of 1,000 boxes containing remains.
In other words, the cases may be tens of thousands more than they have said, with the deaths far more as well. So no, the U.S. doesn’t have the most number of cases in all likelihood.
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