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BBC documentary: a year after the outbreak, how Wuhan changed forever
The World Health Organization (WHO) stated that a team of 10 international scientific experts will travel to Wuhan, China next month to investigate the source of COVID-19.
The Chinese government once did not agree to an independent investigation, but after several months of discussions with the WHO, it decided to allow the team of experts to enter Wuhan.
The virus is believed to have come from a market in Wuhan that sells wild animals.
However, the search for the source of the virus has caused tensions in many places, especially in Sino-US relations.
US President Trump accused China of trying to cover up the original source of the virus.
What is the objective of the investigation?
The team’s biologist in Wuhan told the Associated Press that the WHO is not looking to blame anyone, but to prevent future outbreaks.
“Not finding a country to bear the blame,” said Fabian Leendertz of the Robert Koch Institute in Germany.
“It’s to try to understand what happened and then based on this data, we can try to reduce the risk in the future.”
Dr. Lindez said the goal of the research is to find out when the virus can circulate and whether it originated in Wuhan.
He also said that this mission is expected to last four to five weeks.
When and where was the virus first discovered?
In the early days of the outbreak, the virus was traced to a seafood market in Wuhan, Hubei province. There is an opinion that the virus spread from animals to humans in this market.
However, experts now believe that it can spread quickly there.
Studies have shown that the coronavirus that can infect humans may have been circulating in bat colonies for decades without being detected.
In December last year, Wuhan Central Hospital doctor Li Wenliang tried to warn his colleagues that a new disease could break out, but police ordered him to “stop spreading false information” and investigated for “spreading rumors.”
Li Wenliang contracted the new coronavirus while treating patients in Wuhan and died in February this year.
Image source,fake images
The new corona virus is believed to have first broken out at a seafood market in Wuhan.
In April, some people suspected and accused that the virus could have come from a laboratory in Wuhan.
The telegram from the US State Department showed that embassy staff were concerned about biosecurity there.
The Office of the U.S. National Director of Intelligence said at the time that while the virus was not human-made or genetically modified, officials are investigating whether the virus outbreak was caused by contact with animals or a laboratory accident.
Chinese media have recently reported that the COVID-19 disease may be the first to spread outside of China.
However, analysts noted that these reports do not have a factual basis, and such propaganda reflects the anxiety of Beijing leaders about the damage to China’s international reputation caused by the global epidemic.
Analysis: Can I find the answer when I enter Wuhan?
-Naomi Grimley, CBB Health Correspondent (Naomi Grimley)
The issue of independent investigation into the source of the virus has been linked to international geopolitics and sparked disputes over the WHO.
The Trump administration has always been tough, insisting that the WHO is too weak in dealing with China, citing, for example, that some officials have praised the Chinese government for measures such as the Wuhan blockade, large-scale testing. and the disclosure of the genetic code of the virus.
However, many other countries have also stated that a formal survey is needed, including Australia and the United Kingdom. The Associated Press published a text from a video call in January, which showed WHO officials were complaining that they had not obtained correct data from the Chinese authorities. A two-person WHO team that went to China this summer had a very difficult process of negotiating permission to enter Wuhan.
If this happens, the focus will likely be on basic biological questions: Did the virus originally originate in bats? Is there an “intermediate host” from bats to humans? And is the Wuhan Seafood Market the center of the initial outbreak?
How has China responded to the virus report?
In January, Dr. Mike Ryan, Executive Director of the WHO Health Emergencies Program, praised China’s response to the crisis. He said “the challenge is daunting, but the answer is powerful.”
The WHO stated that Beijing helped curb the spread of the virus by rapidly and actively sharing its knowledge of the genetic code of the virus.
However, several other countries, including the United States, questioned whether China was completely transparent in the early stages of the virus.
In March, Dr. Gauden Galea, representative of the World Health Organization in China, told the BBC that Beijing has some “shortcomings” in the initial stage of response to the outbreak, but experts will study how to avoid such problems in the future.
Later, Trump accused the World Health Organization in Beijing of being too “China-centric” and called the organization’s orientation at the start of the epidemic “really a failure.”
After that, the United States announced its withdrawal from this organization and declared that the related funds would be transferred elsewhere.
However, US President-elect Joe Biden, who will be sworn in on January 20, has established a foreign policy team dedicated to keeping the United States in the World Health Organization.
