"China Battles New Virus Outbreak: A New Health Crisis? | Vantage with Palki Sharma"

I hate to say this but it feels like 2020 all over again—overflowing hospitals and thousands of patients with flu-like symptoms. China is facing a new health crisis, a new disease outbreak that looks a lot like the Wuhan virus. As always, Beijing is sharing no information. They're calling it a pneumonia of unknown origin; that's how Chinese authorities have described it. Beijing says it has set up systems to monitor the outbreak. If you feel like you've heard this before, you have, from the same China some four years back. They're making it sound like it's just the flu season. We do hope it's just that, but sadly, the pictures tell a different story. Take a look at this; this is believed to be from a hospital in China. We cannot verify these pictures, but several videos like this one are going viral. Clearly, there is more to the story. We do not wish to speculate and feed fear, but here is what we know so far. This is not a new disease. Experts say that China is dealing with an outbreak of hMPV—that’s the human meta-pneumovirus. This virus has been around for at least 60 years; it is quite common and easy to catch. So, unlike the Wuhan virus, this time they seem to be dealing with a known disease, and yet there are reasons to be worried. 

The first reason is the scale of the outbreak; it is massive. Cases have been reported in multiple cities across China: Beijing, Tianjin, Shanghai, and Inner Mongolia. These five areas have reported the highest number of cases, but we don’t know about the actual caseload. As usual, China has not shared any data, so we don't know how much worse it could become. The second reason to be worried is the nature of the patients. hMPV attacks the younger sections of the population; children and adolescents are the most vulnerable to contracting this virus, and a large number of patients right now are also children. Plus, treatment is also challenging because, just like the Wuhan virus, hMPV is a respiratory disease. There is no drug to treat it; there are no vaccines either, and the symptoms are similar: fever, cough, and shortness of breath. That's what hMPV patients have. In severe cases, they can develop other complications like bronchitis or pneumonia, so they may need intensive care, oxygen, or even a ventilator. Again, does this sound familiar to you? We all know what happens when hospitals are overwhelmed, when there are too many patients to treat and not enough resources, when oxygen supplies are about to run out, when patients cannot find beds for treatment. 

hMPV is not the same as the Wuhan virus, but it can easily wreak havoc on the health system. China knows this too. In fact, its hospitals are already feeling the strain. Despite that, it refuses to come clean about the outbreak or its scale; it seems to have learned nothing from the last pandemic. It remains in a state of denial. Just look at this story; it came out three days back. The World Health Organization (WHO) made an appeal to Beijing. It has asked China to come clean about the Wuhan virus pandemic. The WHO has sought data from Beijing, and how did Beijing respond? With a denial. 

On the issue of COVID-19 traceability, China has always upheld the spirit of scientific openness and transparency as it actively supported participation in the global scientific traceability methods. At the same time, we firmly oppose any form of political manipulation. China’s openness and transparency have exceeded expectations, they say. They have exceeded expectations. Does the WHO agree with that? In 2023, a WHO official was asked about this; he said, and I quote, “China's lack of data disclosure is simply inexcusable,” and this is a sharp shift in the stance of the WHO. In the early days of the pandemic, they had praised China's response to the Wuhan virus. We all know what a disaster it turned out to be. 

The world cannot afford a repeat of the same mistake; it must remain vigilant about China’s latest disease outbreak. 

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